Trump weighs controls on bailed-out companies
Congress works on measure to aid families
WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump said Thursday the government should take partial ownership of companies bailed out in the coronavirus pandemic, a step that would mark an extraordinary federal reach into the private sector if he’s serious. He also held out hope that treatments for COVID-19 might be at hand, voicing far more optimism about quick therapies than federal scientists have expressed.
Trump gave an upbeat promotion of therapeutic drugs in early testing that he said could be “a game-changer and maybe not” in treating those suffering with COVID-19.
But the head of the Food and Drug Administration cautioned the drugs were still being tested for their effectiveness and safety, a process that takes months and may not yield anything.
On Capitol Hill, lawmakers worked urgently to fashion a $1 trillion aid package to prop up households and the U.S. economy, starting with a White House proposal to send Americans direct aid, potentially $3,000 for a family of four.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell proposed direct payments of $1,200 per person and $2,400 for couples.
Congress also is working to increase production of medical supplies and build temporary field hospitals under new authorities Trump invoked in the Defense Production Act.
Republicans want to have small businesses send paychecks to workers being forced to stay home – through government assistance that would not have to be repaid. They also want to shore up airlines and other industries, but those loans would have to be paid back. Democrats are exploring “unemployment insurance on steroids.”
His mood turning at a White House briefing, Trump stepped up his criticism of China for not telling the world earlier about the spreading disease that started there and went global. The “world is paying a very big price” because of that, he said. Trump now is repeatedly citing the “Chinese virus” or “China virus” despite the fraught connotations of naming a disease after a people or a country.
“Now the whole world is inflicted with this horrible, horrible virus and it’s too bad,” Trump said, lamenting how the U.S economy was healthy “just a few weeks ago.”
More than eight weeks after the first U.S. case of the virus was detected, the federal government is still struggling to conduct wide-scale testing. Compounding the problem, laboratories are reporting shortages of supplies needed to protect health care workers and ventilators that are used to treat respiratory symptoms of the virus.
Trump called the battle against coronavirus a “medical war” not a “financial war.” But he said he believed the U.S. government should take equity stakes in some companies aided by taxpayers. Some Republicans in Congress worry this could lead to the government picking winners and losers. It was not clear that Trump had made any firm decision to attach such strings.
“We will be helping the airline industry,” he said. “We will be helping the cruise ship industry. We probably will be helping the hotel industry.” He said administration will also help small businesses, the “engine of the country.”
But he suggested such federal aid should not be used by companies to buy back their stock, and he said he would support restrictions on executive bonuses and future buybacks from companies receiving the federal support.
On the medical front, Trump and Dr. Stephen Hahn, the Food and Drug Administration commissioner, described several approaches to treatment under testing. Among them: chloroquine, a drug long used to treat malaria; remdesivir, an experimental antiviral that’s being tried in at least five separate studies; antibodies culled from the blood of COVID-19 patients when they recover.
Chloroquine is widely available already and could be used off-label, but Hahn said officials want a formal study to get good information on whether it helps people with COVID-19 and is safe. No new and imminent treatments were announced at the briefing.
“We’re looking at drugs that are already approved for other indications” as a potential bridge or stopgap until studies are completed on drugs under investigation, Hahn said.