How Trump Has Jeopardized Stimulus Relief - The New York Times - 0 views
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The president’s demand that Congress amend a giant coronavirus relief and government spending bill has raised the unexpected prospect that help may no longer be days away.
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To guarantee smooth passage for both the pandemic relief package and the $1.4 trillion in funding to keep the government operating, congressional leaders and top White House officials agreed to combine all of the legislation in one behemoth package.
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But in a video posted online on Tuesday, Mr. Trump conflated the $900 billion relief package with the routine funding portion running alongside it, declaring that the coronavirus rescue bill had been larded with provisions that had nothing to do with the pandemic, like foreign aid and federal fish hatcheries. Many of the items he objected to came straight from his own budget proposal.
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Mr. Trump’s indication that he will not sign the legislation without changes, including more than tripling the size of the direct payments to individuals, from $600 to $2,000, could further delay both the distribution of any payments and the amount of time it takes for jobless workers to begin seeing their payments again. (The legislation, if signed, does ensure workers will receive back payments for the time missed.)
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The House is set to convene on Thursday, Christmas Eve, in a so-called pro forma session, typically a brief meeting that requires one lawmaker be present and lasts for just a few minutes. In that session, House Democrats plan to bring up a stand-alone bill that would provide for $2,000 direct payments for American families.
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“We need to send a clean bill with just $2,000 survival checks and a separate spending/covid relief bill,” Representative Ilhan Omar, Democrat of Minnesota and a frequent target of Mr. Trump’s ire, wrote Tuesday evening on Twitter, adding, “since Trump wants to sign a bill with survival checks, let’s send one to his desk right away.”
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All legislation dies with a Congress, so without Mr. Trump’s signature in the next 10 days, the behemoth legislation would have to be reintroduced and voted on a second time, further delaying funding of the government and providing relief to struggling Americans and businesses.