Negotiations restart on COVID-19 relief
Lawmakers introduce various proposals
WASHINGTON – Negotiations restarted Tuesday as lawmakers introduced coronavirus relief proposals in the latest effort to break the logjam and reach a deal in the few remaining weeks a divided Congress has left in session.
The day started with a bipartisan group of lawmakers introducing a roughly $908 billion proposal intended as a temporary package that would run until April. It ended with two additional proposals, one offered privately by Democratic leaders to Republicans and a third that Republicans have approved with the White House and could be voted on by the Senate.
The flurry of activity arrives after months of impasse as both sides dug in their heels before a bitter election amid a surge in coronavirus cases that has nearly 100,000 Americans hospitalized. The cold-weather spike has troubled small-business owners fearful of shutting down again without federal relief and workers who exhausted unemployment benefits – programs Congress has yet to revive.
Though the proposals display a consensus that lawmakers want to act swiftly, the competing ideas and limited time in session will make passing relief an uphill climb.
“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., who helped lead the bipartisan proposal offered Tuesday morning.
Congress has not passed a comprehensive relief package since March, and as case totals climbed and benefits lapsed, Democrats and Republicans were unable to come together on another deal. The Democratic-controlled House and Republican-controlled Senate offered their own versions of legislation and negotiations continued between the White House and Democratic leaders, all to no avail.
Millions of Americans face the possibility of several more aid programs expiring after Christmas if Congress does not act.
What’s in the bipartisan proposal
The Problem Solvers Caucus, a bipartisan group of House lawmakers, and a moderate group of senators said they worked together on the compromise over the past month over pizza and pasta in each other’s houses.
The proposal they outlined Tuesday morning would upset partisans on both sides, the lawmakers said, but is a necessary compromise.
The proposal includes:
$160 billion for state, local and tribal governments
$180 billion for a federal boost in unemployment insurance
$288 billion for small businesses, including a reauthorization of the Paycheck Protection Program
The proposal does not include another round of $1,200 checks for Americans, which was part of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act passed in March.
Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., who chairs the Senate Appropriations Committee, indicated the proposal might be too large. The price tag is “bigger than what we’ve been doing. I’ve advocated a small number – the skinny package,” which is roughly $500 billion.
White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany said in a statement the $908 billion proposal “has not been a topic of discussion” between the Trump administration and Republican congressional leaders.
McConnell brings back GOP plan
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said Tuesday the best chance of passing COVID-19 relief would be adding measures into a mustpass government spending bill.
He said he’d been in discussions with House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and White House chief of staff Mark Meadows about what President Donald Trump would be willing to sign into law, and “I think we have a sense of what that is.”
McConnell said he was revamping Senate Republicans’ proposal, which failed to pass the chamber in October, with policies Trump supports.
“The way you get a result is you have to have a presidential signature,” he said, “so I felt the first thing we needed to do is to find out what the president would in fact sign. We believe we’ve got the answer to that.”
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., voiced support for the bipartisan group of lawmakers, calling their plan a “good effort.”
He chastised McConnell for going to the White House with another attempt to pass COVID-19 relief without input from Democrats. He declined to detail what was in the proposal Democrats sent, saying it was a private means of jump-starting negotiations.