‘No reason’ Congress can’t agree on stimulus package by end of year, McConnell says
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell addressed the need to pass another coronavirus stimulus package, saying there was “no reason” that Congress can’t pass one by the end of the year the day before a bipartisan group of senators said they plan to introduce new legislation.
McConnell said Monday that Congress has several things it “should get done before the end of the year,” Business Insider reported.
“There is no reason — none — why we should not deliver another major pandemic relief package to help the American people through what seems poised to be the last chapters of this battle,” he said.
McConnell also tweeted Monday, blaming House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer for the lack of coronavirus legislation.
“The American people need more help now. Congress should deliver more COVID relief this year,” he tweeted. “Even House and Senate Democrats are publicly saying that Speaker Pelosi’s and Leader Schumer’s all-or-nothing obstruction needs to stop.”
Congress reconvened on Monday in a race to agree on a government funding bill in order to prevent a possible shutdown at the end of the year, Reuters reported.
If a deal is reached, the COVID-19 relief package will most likely be included in the spending bill, McConnell said, according to The Hill.
“It will all likely come in one package,” McConnell told reporters Tuesday afternoon.
A group of senators from both parties said Tuesday that they are planning to introduce a $908 billion package that includes state and local aid, unemployment benefits, loans for small businesses and protection from coronavirus lawsuits, according to Politico.
The legislation allocates $160 billion for state and local governments, $180 billion in unemployment insurance, $288 billion for small businesses, $82 billion for schools and $45 billion for transportation, Politico reported.
Negotiations on a relief package so far
Democrats, Republicans and the White House have tried but failed to negotiate a follow-up package to the CARES Act, which was passed in March and provided most Americans with $1,200 relief checks and temporarily expanded unemployment benefits during the coronavirus pandemic.
President-elect Joe Biden’s advisers are preparing for the chances of a recession next year and are pushing for lawmakers to agree on a stimulus package, even if it doesn’t live up to the deal that Democrats were hoping to pass, The New York Times reported.
Earlier, Biden had said he would support legislation similar to the HEROES Act, a $3 trillion coronavirus aid bill passed by House Democrats in May that never received a vote in the Senate, according to CNBC. A $2.2 trillion updated version of the aid package was unveiled in September.
Meanwhile, Senate Republicans introduced their own version of a $1 trillion second stimulus package, called the Health, Economic Assistance, Liability Protection and Schools (HEALS) Act, in July.
After talks between lawmakers hit another impasse, Pelosi and Schumer sent McConnell a letter in November, asking him to “join us at the negotiating table,” The Hill reported.
“We write to request that you join us at the negotiating table this week so that we can work towards a bipartisan, bicameral COVID-19 relief agreement to crush the virus and save American lives,” Schumer and Pelosi wrote in the letter.
McConnell said that Biden supports a ”$2.5 trillion or nothing” relief bill, adding that he and his fellow Republicans are open to legislation valued at $500 billion, “narrowly targeted at schools, at health care providers, at PPP, and of course liability reform,” CNBC reported.
This story was originally published December 1, 2020 at 11:13 AM with the headline "‘No reason’ Congress can’t agree on stimulus package by end of year, McConnell says."