Democrats Present New $3 Trillion Coronavirus Relief Package, Including $1 Trillion for the States
Includes Pelosi’s political wish list items like banning voter i.d. and mandating voting by mail.
I blogged this morning about Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi wanting to push through the next Wuhan coronavirus bill without many conversations.
Pelosi dropped the $3 trillion package this afternoon, which includes another round of payments to Americans and $1 trillion for the states.
From CNBC:
- Nearly $1 trillion in relief for state and local governments
- A second round of direct payments of $1,200 per person, and up to $6,000 for a household
- About $200 billion for hazard pay for essential workers who face heightened health risks during the crisis
- $75 billion for coronavirus testing and contact tracing — a key effort to restart businesses
- An extension of the $600 per week federal unemployment insurance benefit through January (the provision approved in March is set to expire after July)
$175 billion in rent, mortgage and utility assistance - Subsidies and a special Affordable Care Act enrollment period to people who lose their employer-sponsored health coverage
- More money for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, including a 15% increase in the maximum benefit
- Measures designed to buoy small businesses and help them keep employees on payroll, such as $10 billion in emergency disaster assistance grants and a strengthened employee retention tax credit
- Money for election safety during the pandemic and provisions to make voting by mail easier
- Relief for the U.S. Postal Service
The bill comes after the Western States Pact – California, Colorado, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington – asked the federal government to throw them a $1 trillion.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom said the money would also go to local governments.
The governors requested the money to help “support basic operations and prevent layoffs in public sectors like health, safety and education, with jobs ranging from teachers to firefighters.”
From Denver Business Journal:
“It is now clear that Covid-19 will be with us for the foreseeable future and the worst of its economic impact is yet to come,” they wrote. “Our states are on the front line against the virus, while at the same time leading our states’ recovery. Each of us has seen first-hand how Covid-19 has caused a national recession that we are seeing play out in our states — resulting in a record number of lost wages and business failures, spiraling unemployment and substantial, unplanned Covid-19 driven costs.”
They warn that without federal support, states and cities will be “forced to make impossible decisions — like whether to fund critical public health care that will help us recover or prevent layoffs of teachers, police officers, firefighters and other first responders.”
The letter comes after reports revealed California faces a $54 billion deficit due to the state-wide shutdown, which began in mid-March.
Since then, over four million people in the state have filed for unemployment with non-essential jobs and businesses closing down.
Newsom said California could recover if the federal government helps out the state, which would hit the spots mentioned in the letter:
But the revenue shortfall means the state’s constitutionally required funding level for public schools and community colleges will fall by $18.3 billion.
State funding accounts for 80 percent of most school district budgets, which are mostly spent on teacher and staff salaries, said Troy Flint, spokesman for the California Association of School Boards. He said the shortfall will “have a devastating impact on school staffing levels and the amount of services and programs that K-12 schools can offer to families.”
However, chairman of the budget committee, claimed the state may not be able to cut enough spending in order to make ends meet. He said the state “may have to look at some additional revenue.”
ADDED: It’s stuffed with Pelosi political wish list items.
Pelosi's wish list bill is a nightmare scenario for voter fraud (and federalism).
Mandatory early voting for every state.
Mandatory mail-in ballots for everyone.
Voter ID and witness requirements prohibited for voting by mail. pic.twitter.com/sQ2Vc55zcl
— Nate Madden (@NateOnTheHill) May 12, 2020
This would overwhelmingly benefit wealthy residents of blue states https://t.co/s3deNrp0pC
— Peter J. Hasson (@peterjhasson) May 12, 2020
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Comments
Nancy wants to spend 2.7 Trillion of that on Luxury Ice Cream.
The Western States Pact wants the people in fiscally responsible states to bail them out. Bless their hearts…
Cool! I can pay California taxes without the bother of moving there.
This is a peek under the hood of the Dems’ plans for what they’re going to do the minute they get control of the Legislative and Executive branches again. Just like Obama, minutes after the swearing-in ceremony will come the signing ceremony, because this is how they get power. A billion taxpayer dollars to this company results in ten million dollars in political donations coming back. As long as the Republicans keep blocking their bribes, the Dems are starving for cash.
Her refrigerator doors remind me of a mortuary. When she is embalmed, for the final time, I hope they can keep her sincere facial expressions intact.
No, no, no, no. 1000 times NO.
But who’s going to stop them?
The GOP?
Don’t depend on McConnell, but I do trust President Trump to veto this abortion if it passes the Senate.
She isn’t so stupid as to think this will pass the Senate. It’s a PR /fund raising opportunity and a whole boatload of bargaining chips.
If McConnell has any brains (He might. Sometimes it’s hard to tell) he’ll just ignore it.
Her strategy is to demand the sky and then in the end she gets what she wants. I believe more than ever that she and McConnell cut a deal before this even started.
In the words of Dana Carvey (as Bush 41: “Not gonna do it, wouldn’t be prudent…”. In the words of a conservative = no freaking way.
I’ve noticed new ads encouraging support for state and municipal employees.. the “essentials” amongst us and also the USPS reminders of the snow, sleet, whatever hurdles they encounter. The former ad is very misleading unless one knows it’s about $$$ for pensions and pay raises. Sorry… right now… ALL workers are essential for this nation.
……except government workers in goverment bureaucracies…….
“Non-government workers matter!”
If only we had 3 branches of government. The queen could be stopped.
before all this liberal voice buying we were 23 plus trillion in debt. that WILL be paid.
Dear Madame Speaker,
At this time the relevant persons within the administration are subsumed by their actions related to Covid-19 response in order to make up for any perceived ‘lost or wasted time’ by those persons in the early days of this crisis.
As you yourself have been one of the more prominent proponents of the ‘lost or wasted time’ hypothesis, I feel certain you will understand that these persons will remain simply too busy to entertain your request or formulate any additional response until the conclusion of the current crisis which is expected to last an additional 18 months, according to some Governors.
Thank you for your correspondence. The administration looks forward and remains committed to working with you once the crisis passes.
Sincerely, your President
DJT
CC AG William Barr
note -Bill could you ask John Durham to include the Speaker’s enclosed bribery and election fraud attempt in his investigation? THX PDJT
The President’s reelection campaign ought to market VETO pens for this one if it makes it that far.
The objective is for this bill to fail in the Senate so that Slow Joe can campaign against the mean, heartless, state-hating Donald Trump in November.
Won’t work.
I doubt the socialists think they’ll get cheat-by-mail voting.
What they really want are state bailouts for the most egregious of the financially mismanaged states — California, Illinois, New York, etc. All Big Blue states.
Illinois alone has about $200 billion in unfunded government worker pension and retirement benefits. Property taxes there are already the highest in the nation. The deficit grows bigger every year.
The Dems have got to fund those government employee pension and retirement benefits somehow. Every $10 billion or so they can get will help.
JHogan,
It occurs to me that if the d want to do mail out/mail in ballots instead of a more reasonable request for absentee ballots that follow the existing process with the exception that every registered voter could request one then maybe they would make a deal.
The d can have mail out/mail in ballots BUT the ballots only go to the persons listed as paying the property taxes. So if you own multiple properties like Bernie Sanders then you get multiple ballots! If you don’t pay property taxes you don’t get a ballot in the mail but you can still go vote in person.
Seems as logical, reasonable and constitutional as the d plan to disregard centuries of history and precedent in their send out ballots to everyone, even if deceased, in jail, in another state etc and of course even if that voter didn’t request a ballot.
This sorry excuse for a bill should not even be heard before the Senate! It is fraudulent in that it does nothing for the flu problem except to line the pockets of communist democrats!
Hopefully the Senate strips the SALT provision in the Democrat bill and labels it for what it is – a poison pill and a giveaway to the ultra-wealthy. Let Democrat’s make the case that millionaires need freebies at a time when unemployment is more than 14%.
Each of us has seen first-hand how Covid-19 has caused a national recession that we are seeing play out in our states
That’t the fundamental misapprehension—OK, lie—about the whole situation. The disease didn’t freeze America’s economy; governments, and governments alone, did that.
why not another trillion for dead people while you’re at it, they had been passed over so far
Why not, the Dems buy everyone else’s vote. Dead people deserve to get something in return for their support too.
They’ve been a reliable voting bloc for the D’s in every election. It’s time to stop taking them for granted!
The governors requested the money to help “support basic operations and prevent layoffs in public sectors like health, safety and education, with jobs ranging from teachers to firefighters.”
Just like with local tax levies, they always threaten to layoff workers and terminate services they know the public appreciates — and never the countless bureaucrats, DMV clerks, and other dead weight in unnecessary agencies.
Lay DEM off.
Lay DEM off.
Lay DEM all off.
Not one more federal cent for Coronavirus spending! People are now hurting because of the states’ ridiculous rules. Let the states run and fund their own unemployment schemes!
That picture makes the case for putting hand grenades in ice cream.
Now we get to find out how utterly corrupt the McConnell’s Republican Senate truly is. Enough kabuki already! We’ve heard enough of the empty talk! This is yet another unconstitutional Pelosi bill circumventing the constitutional process. Refuse to even accept it!
McConnell should return it with an nice little note saying
“You put all your punctuation marks in the wrong place. There’s several dozen errors on every page. Fix it!