PROSPECTS FOR STIMULUS DEAL GROW
Congressional leaders agree to try for year-end pact
The prospects for a bipartisan stimulus deal appeared to brighten Friday as Speaker Nancy Pelosi projected fresh optimism that the House and Senate could come to terms and President-elect Joe Biden prodded lawmakers to “act and act now” on a measure he insisted was within reach.
Even as liberal Democrats warned that the emerging compromise was woefully inadequate amid economic devastation wrought by the pandemic, Pelosi, D-Calif., told reporters that she and Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., the majority leader, had agreed to redouble efforts to find a deal that could be merged with an enormous year-end spending package under discussion.
“That would be our hope because that is the vehicle leaving the station,” Pelosi said at a news conference in the Capitol on Friday, a day after speaking with McConnell. He expressed simi
lar resolve Thursday.
After months in which the two top congressional leaders refused to budge from their respective positions, the shared goal marked significant progress — particularly as Pelosi appeared poised to accept a far smaller stimulus package than she had championed.
But while momentum has built behind a $908 billion plan outlined by a bipartisan
group of moderates that top Democrats have embraced as the starting point for talks, significant hurdles remained. No actual bill has been written yet, and McConnell has yet to offer an explicit endorsement of a plan that is several times larger than what he has previously said Republicans could accept.
Biden said Friday that he was “confident” that an agreement was possible but
pointedly declined to answer when asked by reporters whether he had spoken with McConnell, a negotiating counterpart with whom he has brokered many deals.
“It’s not going to satisfy everybody,” Biden said of the compromise plan, “but the option is, if you insist on everything, we’re likely to get nothing on both sides.”
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., the former Democratic candidate for president, was among those who were not satisfied. He said Friday that he could not support the proposal without changes, deriding the inclusion of a liability shield for businesses operating during the pandemic as “a get-out-of-jail-free card to companies that put the lives of their workers and customers at risk.”
He said the omission of another round of $1,200 direct payments to Americans was “unacceptable.”
“I look forward to working with my colleagues in the House and Senate to significantly improve this bill,” Sanders concluded. “But in its current form, I cannot support it.”
The compromise proposal was offered by a bipartisan group of lawmakers, including Sens. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va.; Mitt Romney, RUtah; and Susan Collins, RMaine. The group and their aides are expected to continue working to finalize legislation through the weekend.
Stimulus talks have been stalemated for months, with lawmakers unable to resolve differences over issues like the liability protections, a Republican demand that Democrats have resisted, and providing federal aid to state and local governments, a top priority for Democrats that many Republicans oppose. They are also still struggling to resolve a number of policy disputes in the must-pass bills needed to keep the government funded beyond Dec. 11.
The emerging compromise would revive lapsed federal unemployment benefits at $300 a week for 18 weeks and provide billions of dollars in funding for small businesses, schools and the imminent distribution of a vaccine.
“What I have real concerns about is the American people thinking, Congress struck a deal, we’re getting COVID relief, and then their lives changing very little,” Rep. Alexandria OcasioCortez, D-N.Y., told reporters on Capitol Hill. “Will I support resources to hospitals and schools and firefighters? Absolutely. But I am extremely concerned that it’s not going to solve the immediate problems that people have.”
Although Pelosi conceded there were still obstacles to an agreement, she insisted there would be “sufficient time” to close a deal before the Dec. 11 government funding deadline.