Senate waits on coronavirus action

WASHINGTON — In March and April, Congress passed enormous coronavirus relief packages at warp speed. Now, the U.S. Senate is hitting the brakes on further aid with Republican leadership taking a “wait and see” approach.

Negotiations over the additional legislation will not start in the Senate until the third or fourth week of June, said Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, on Thursday.

“We’re opening up the economy, we ought to know the impact of that. And No. 2, we ought to know what’s accomplished with money we’ve put out, with hundreds of billions of it not even out yet,” Grassley said. “We want to see how this works out. If we have to do more, we’ll do more.”

Disappointed Democrats, who feel action is needed now, bemoaned that a bill may not be passed until midto late-July. Asking what more do you need, they point to U.S. unemployment numbers — 38 million people filed for unemployment in nine weeks, rivaling the Great Depression — and over 100,000 deaths from the virus.

The House of Representatives passed its vision for the next coronavirus bill — a $3 trillion package with billions in relief for states, education, health care and the nation’s social safety net. House Democrats hoped passage of the partisan bill would prod Senate to action, but that does not appear to have worked.

But as Rep. Jim Himes, D-4, said “Now the ball is in [Senate Majority Leader] Mitch McConnell’s court.”

You can bet that Democrats

plan to make this pause in action an election issue and will argue it deepened the economic and health crisis. You could see this strategy in action when Sen. Chris Murphy, DConn., tweeted Thursday “Senate is voting on lifetime judges because Mitch McConnell hasn’t ‘felt the urgency of acting immediately.’ If you needed to reason to help us flip the Senate in 2020, this is it.”

There are a few areas where Democrats and Republicans agree more must be done. Senators struck a bipartisan deal ease restrictions on federal Paycheck

Protection Program loans to small businesses. They’re working to pass it as soon as possible.

The deal would give businesses more time to spend the money and allow it to be spent on more things and still be forgiven, Politico reported. The Small Business Administration loan program has already awarded loans to over 50,000 Connecticut businesses.

Like other kinds of relief crafted by Congress back in March, Paycheck Protection Program needs tweaks because it was written as a form of short-term aid, but now it is clear the path to recovery from the coronavirus is likely to be long.

Biden snags new endorsement

Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., endorsed former Vice President Joe Biden for president on Wednesday, beccoming the second member of the Connecticut Congressional delegation to do so.

“Joe Biden is the steady hand our country desperately needs,” Blumenthal said. “I first came to know Joe through his son, Beau, when we were both serving as our state’s attorneys general. Beau was a smart, strategic fighter who always looked out for the little guy — qualities he inherited from his dad.”

Beau Biden, the former attorney general of Delaware, died at age 46 from brain cancer.

Blumenthal said he has worked most closely with Joe Biden on the issue of gun violence in the wake of the Sandy Hook shooting in 2012.

Biden has picked up a slew of congressional endorsements in recent weeks and months, after securing enough delegates to become to presumptive Democratic nominee for president. Himes previously endorsed Biden.

A Quinnipiac University Poll this week found Biden is leading President Donald Trump in a head-to-head matchup, as Trump’s approval rating sinks. The national poll of registered voters released Wednesday found Biden leads Trump 50 to 39 percent in the election for president.

Forty-two percent of voters approve of the job Trump is doing, while 53 percent disapprove, the poll found. That’s compared to a 45-51 percent job approval rating he received in April, his highest ever.

On coronavirus specifically, 41 percent of voters approve of Trump’s work and 56 percent disapprove. By a sixteen-point margin, 55 to 39 percent, voters say they think Biden would do a better job than Trump handling the response to the coronavirus.

Both Biden and Trump have had to recalibrate their campaigns as a result of the virus and are reaching out to voters virtually, although Trump has recently suggested he’d like to bring back his mass rallies.