Lawmakers introduce virus relief plan
$908B package does not include second stimulus payment
WASHINGTON – A group of lawmakers introduced a bipartisan framework for a COVID-19 relief proposal in the latest effort to break the logjam in negotiations, but their proposal faces an uncertain future in a divided Congress with only weeks left in session.
The roughly $908 billion proposal is intended as a temporary package that would run until April next year, the lawmakers said.
“It would be stupidity on steroids if Congress left for Christmas without doing an interim package as a bridge,” said Sen. Mark Warner, D-VA.
The group, led by the Problem Solvers Caucus, a bipartisan group of House lawmakers, and a moderate group of senators, said they had worked together on the compromise over the past month over pizza and pasta in each others’ houses, including that of Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-alaska.
The compromise would upset partisans on both sides, they said, but was necessary as the country faced rising COVID-19 case counts and economic pain.
The proposal includes, among other provisions:
h $160 billion for state, local, and tribal governments.
h $180 billion for a federal boost to unemployment insurance, coming out to $300 a week.
h $288 billion for small businesses, including a reauthorization of the Paycheck Protection Program.
h $45 billion for transportation.
h $10 billion for the United States Postal Service.
h Short-term federal protection from coronavirus-related lawsuits.
The proposal does not include another round of $1,200 stimulus checks.
Sen. Mitt Romney, R-utah, noted the smaller price tag of the bill, close to half
of what Democrats and the White House had been negotiating before the election. Republicans had previously balked at the price tag of larger stimulus legislation.
“We’ve come together, and we’ve been very careful,” he said, noting the bill only included $348 billion of new funding, with the remainder coming from repurposed funding from the last major stimulus bill.
When asked about the proposal, Sen. Richard Shelby, R-ala., who chairs the Senate Appropriations Committee, indicated it might be too large, telling reporters the price tag was “bigger than what we’ve been doing. I’ve advocated a small number – the skinny package,” which is roughly $500 billion.
The lawmakers said they had talked with leaders in their parties and Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin about their framework, but it was unclear whether the White House or congressional leadership would support it.
The second-ranking Senate Democrat, Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, said Tuesday the proposal should come up for a vote in the Senate. “They have tried to find a middle ground, and I believe they have,” he said.
Congress has not passed a comprehensive relief package since March, and as case totals climbed and benefits lapsed, Democrats and Republicans have been unable to come together on another deal.
According to a source familiar with the meeting but not authorized to speak on the record, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Mnuchin were set to speak by phone Tuesday afternoon about government funding and COVID-19 relief in their first conversation since October, when negotiations last collapsed.
The top leaders in the Senate on both sides, on the other hand, continued Tuesday morning to blame the other party for the impasse in negotiations.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch Mcconnell said on the Senate floor that Democrats had held up aid by pursuing an “all-or-nothing approach,” though he hoped Democrats would work with Republicans on COVID-19 relief in the “enormously important areas where we do not even disagree.”
And in a speech following Mcconnell’s, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer accused Republicans of including “poison pills” in relief legislation – provisions Democrats opposed that would doom the proposals to failure. “I hope that as we get closer to the end of the year, the partisan posturing on the Republican side will give way to some genuine compromises,” he said.