He complicated the GOP talks for days by demanding a payroll tax cut that has few fans in Congress before dropping it. And the administration resisted Republican plans to step up testing and other health efforts. The president even reiterated at a press conference Thursday his plan to rebuild the FBI headquarters in downtown Washington — not exactly a pandemic priority.
Worries among Republicans that they would catch the blame for checks stopping for millions of workers across the country had them briefly discussing another temporary patch in the middle of the week before dropping the idea. Senators like Cruz and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina warned against what they consider to be excessive aid, arguing they were hurting the economy by paying people an extra $600-a-week unemployment bonus.
White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows outlined one possible fallback position to reporters Thursday, suggesting separately passing a supplemental unemployment insurance and aid for schools while negotiators continue to look for a bigger deal.
Democrats were largely on the outside looking in on the Republican scrum. Schumer declared Democrats united behind the $3.5 trillion plan passed by the House with far larger checks doing out to individuals and workers and aid to states than Republicans are willing to contemplate.
“Here we are, still waiting for the Republicans to put together a partisan bill that will never become law just so they can muster up the courage to negotiate,” Schumer said Thursday.
--With assistance from Laura Litvan, Erik Wasson and Billy House.
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.