Biden to meet with Republican senators on smaller relief bill
Plan would cut size of checks, wouldn’t hike minimum wage
WASHINGTON — Ten Republican senators announced plans Sunday to release an approximately $600 billion coronavirus relief package as a counterproposal to President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion plan, posing a test for the new president who campaigned as a bipartisan deal-maker.
The senators, led by Susan Collins, R-Maine, said they would formally unveil the package on Monday. In a letter to Biden, they requested to meet with him and said they were offering their proposal in recognition of his “calls for unity.”
Biden spoke to Collins and has invited the 10 Republican lawmakers to the White House “for a full exchange of views” early this week, White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in a Sunday night statement.
The potential bipartisan discussion comes as Democrats prepare to move forward Monday to set up a partisan path forward for Biden’s relief bill, which Republicans have dismissed as overly costly, given that Congress has already committed about $4 trillion to fighting the pandemic, including $900 billion in December.
The GOP proposal jettisons certain elements that have drawn Republican opposition, such as increasing the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour.
It would also reduce the size of a new round of checks Biden wants to send to Americans, from $1,400 per individual to $1,000 — while significantly reducing the income limits that determine eligibility for the stimulus payments.
A $600 billion plan that is a fraction of the size of Biden’s proposal is unlikely to draw much, if any, Democratic support. However, the GOP offer presents a challenge for Biden, who campaigned on promises to unify Congress and the country and must decide whether to ignore the GOP overture or make a genuine effort to find common ground across the aisle.
“We want to work in good faith with you and your administration to meet the health, economic and societal challenges of the covid crisis,” the Republican lawmakers wrote.
Top Biden economic adviser Brian Deese said on CNN’s “State of the Union” that the White House had received the Republicans’ letter and would review it. But he emphasized that speed was of the essence, and he refused to say whether Biden was open to entertaining a smaller overall price tag.
“The president is uncompromising when it comes to the speed that we need to act at to address this crisis,” Deese said.
“The provisions of the president’s plan, the American Rescue Plan, are calibrated to the economic crisis that we face,” Deese said.
The White House is pushing its plan amid signs of a broader economic slowdown and a continued wave of enormously high unemployment claims of close to 1 million a week. The emergence in the U.S. of highly transmissible coronavirus variants has also intensified fears that another wave of lockdowns will be necessary.
Because the Senate is split 50-50 between Republicans and Democrats, if 10 Democrats were to join the Republicans, they could reach the 60-vote threshold necessary to pass legislation under regular Senate procedures.
Democrats are planning to skirt the 60-vote requirement using special budget rules that would allow the Biden package to pass with a simple majority vote. Democrats control the Senate because Vice President Kamala Harris can cast tiebreaking votes.
Democratic aides said that the GOP proposal would not change their plans to move forward with the budget bill this week that would set the stage for party-line passage of Biden’s plan.
Psaki’s statement said Biden also spoke to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., on Sunday as they prepare to push his relief package.
“The key to getting robust job opportunities is to cease any delay, any inaction, any waitand-see around this rescue plan,” Jared Bernstein, a member of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, said on “Fox News Sunday.”
“The American people could not care less about budget process. … They need relief, and they need it now,” Bernstein said.
Biden’s plan would send $1,400 payments to individuals with incomes up to $75,000 per year, and couples making up to $150,000.
Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, one of the signers of the letter, said the GOP plan would lower those thresholds to $50,000 for individuals and $100,000 for couples. Instead of $1,400 checks, the GOP plan would propose $1,000 checks, according to Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., another member of the group.
The GOP plan would also reduce Biden’s proposal for extending emergency federal unemployment benefits, which are set at $300 a week and will expire in mid-March. The Biden plan would increase those benefits to $400 weekly and extend them through September. The GOP plan would keep the payments at $300 per week and extend them through June, according to three people with knowledge of the plan.
Portman criticized Democrats for their plans to go it alone, saying this approach would “jam Republicans and really jam the country.”
The signers of the letter include eight Republican senators who are part of a bipartisan group that has conferred with Biden administration officials about the relief bill. In addition to Collins, Portman and Cassidy, they are Sens. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mitt Romney of Utah, Todd Young of Indiana, Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia and Jerry Moran of Kansas. Also signing are Mike Rounds of South Dakota and Thom Tillis of North Carolina.
Cassidy strongly criticized Biden for not soliciting broader input from senators in both parties. Speaking on “Fox News Sunday,” Cassidy said the Republican package amounted to $600 billion and was “targeted to the needs of the American people.”
Cassidy also said Biden’s push to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour would cost millions of jobs.
“You don’t want bipartisanship. You want the patina of bipartisanship,” Cassidy said.