The House passed the $484 billion emergency coronavirus relief package Thursday evening, after a deal was caught between partisan goalposts for over a week.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will hold an enrollment ceremony Thursday evening before sending it off to the president’s desk.
The vast majority of the funds — $310 billion — will replenish the small business paycheck protection program that dried up last Friday. Of that, $60 billion is set aside for small business lenders and community banks.
It also includes funds for an expanded list of programs that Democrats had pushed for over a week of negotiations: $60 billion for small business loans and grants in economic disaster funds, $75 billion for hospitals, and $25 billion for coronavirus testing. At least $11 billion of testing funds will be given to states and tribes to oversee. Up to $1 billion can be used to test the uninsured.
The package also sets a few stipulations. Within 21 days of the bill being enacted, the administration needs to provide a report on COVID-19 testing, which will include demographic data on cases, hospitalizations and deaths. The Trump administration also has 30 days to present its national testing plan to Congress.
Not all members were able to travel to Capitol Hill Thursday for the recorded vote due to health concerns.
The House even implemented new policies as safety precautions — requesting members use spaced out voting machines on the floor, urging everyone to wear masks, and breaking up the vote into nine blocks and only allowing small groups of members on the floor at a time.
The provisions in the final bill themselves were not controversial — lawmakers squabbled, however, over how best to approach the funding issues.
Republicans wanted a clean extension of funds for the small business paycheck loan program and accused Democrats of intentionally delaying the aid for leverage. They laid the blame for an additional 4.4 million jobless applications at Democrats’ feet this week because the bipartisan small business paycheck loan program dried up on April 15.
Democrats, on the other hand, maintain that Republicans were dragging their feet on money that needed to go out anyway to help the overly stressed healthcare system and shore up resources for testing.
“What we have on the Floor today is the result of — not the time we delayed the legislation — but the time that the Republicans refused to accept the facts that we needed $100 billion for our hospitals and our testing,” Mrs. Pelosi, California Democrat, said on the House Floor. “I think it’s really important for people to understand what this fight is about.”
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, California Republican, brushed off the speaker’s defense, saying it was more political spin.
“The lady doth protest too much, me think. If you have you to explain as hard as you can, and spend with as much political might as you can, why you laid 4.4 million people off because you felt better to tell Mitch McConnell in a program that put out and saved 30 million jobs that you are going to hold it up to prove a point — that’s not what I’d want to hear in history,” he said.
While lawmakers on either side praised the eventual compromise they voted on Thursday, not all members were happy with the deal.
Progressives were frustrated that the bill didn’t go far enough to address their concerns in the previous bill, which they felt left too many unsupported.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who criticized the package as a “$5 bill” earlier this week, was the lone Democrat to vote against it Thursday.
“It is a joke when Republicans say that they have urgency around this bill,” the New York freshman said in an impassioned floor speech. “You are not trying to fix this bill for mom & pops. We have to fight to fund hospitals. Fighting to fund testing. That is what we’re fighting for in this bill. It is unconscionable.”
“If you had urgency, you would legislate like rent was due on May 1st.”
A handful of Republicans that voted against the bill had voiced concerns about the mounting price tag and lack of payfors with Congress allocating nearly $3 trillion in total to combat the virus and the economic catastrophe in its wake.
The major Democratic priority left out of this latest package was additional funding for state and local governments.
In an interview with radio host Hugh Hewitt, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said federal assistance to state and local governments needed to be more thoroughly evaluated, noting that many Republicans feel it would be akin to a bailout.
“I would certainly be in favor of allowing states to use the bankruptcy route,” Mr. McConnell said. “It saves some cities. And there’s no good reason for it not to be available. My guess is their first choice would be for the federal government to borrow money from future generations to send it down to them now so they don’t have to do that. That’s not something I’m going to be in favor of.”
Democrats, however, argue the funds are less about trickle-down bureaucracy and more focused on keeping essential emergency workers — including firefighters, and police officers — paid.
On Thursday, they slammed Mr. McConnell for his bankruptcy remarks.
“Unfortunately, they did not want to put the heroes into this bill today as fully as they should by supporting state and local [governments],” Mrs. Pelosi said. “The distinguished leader on the Senate side, Mr. McConnell said ‘I think the states should go bankrupt.’…Oh really? What made you think that was a good idea?”
Democrats intend on putting state and local funds at the forefront of their phase four coronavirus package, which will also include infrastructure and election reform provisions. Republicans have not signaled any interest in moving ahead so soon on another high budget bill.
