GOP shrugs off Trump’s call for ‘higher’ proposal on virus relief bill
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump parachuted into the coronavirus aid debate Wednesday, upbraiding his Republican allies for proposing too small of a relief package and encouraging both parties to go for a bigger one that would include his priority of $1,200 stimulus checks for most Americans.
But his top GOP allies — who worked for weeks with the White House to construct the aid package Trump criticized — shrugged off the president’s tweet. They also weighed in against a $1.5 trillion aid package backed by moderates in both parties that earned praise from the White House.
All the key players in the entrenched impasse over a COVID-19 rescue package instead focused their energies on finger-pointing and gamesmanship, even as political nervousness was on the rise among Democrats frustrated by a stalemate in which their party shares the blame. There remained no sign that talks between t he
White House and congressional Democrats would restart.
“Go for the much higher numbers, Republicans,” Trump tweeted.
The smaller bill from Senate Republicans that Trump criticized did not include $300 billion for a second round of Trump- endorsed stimulus checks, which the White House said is a top priority.
“What the president was referring to was the $500 billion bill that passed the Senate,” said White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany. “It didn’t include direct payments. He wants more than the $500 billion and he’s very keen to see these direct stimulus payments.”
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., says any deal will have to include far more than just another set of “Trump checks” and a handful of other priorities.
“All they want is to have the President’s name on a check going out. ... That’s all he really cares about,” Pelosi said.
At issue is a fifth coronavirus relief package that would extend supplemental jobless benefits to replace a $600-per-week COVID unemployment benefit that expired at the end of July. It would also funnel more than $100 billion to help schools open, provide assistance to state and local governments, and funnel more money into a program that directly subsidizes business hit hardest by the pandemic.
Pelosi says she’s willing to negotiate from a $2.2 trillion marker set last month, but Senate GOP leaders haven’t budged from a $650 billion measure that Democrats scuttled last week via filibuster.