House Republicans blocked Democrats’ attempt to meet President Donald Trump’s demand to pay most Americans $2,000 to help weather the coronavirus pandemic.
Republicans objected to the bill House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer sought to pass by unanimous consent Thursday to replace the $600 payments in the latest pandemic relief legislation with the $2,000 payments.
Jon Lukomnik is a long-time institutional investor who has run a large pension fund, been a managing director at a top ten hedge fund, and also been on the creditor's committee of WorldCom. He currently serve on the Deloitte Audit Quality Advisory Committee and the Standing Advisory Group of the PCAOB.
Jesse Kallman is an expert in the drone and software industry with more than 13 years of related experience. He has worked in various parts of the industry including research at Georgia Tech, federal policy at the FAA, and advocacy with groups like AUVSI. He is president of Atlanta-based, Airbus-backed company, Airbus Aerial.
Laura Keller is senior director of customer experiences for NTT DATA Services with more than 15 years of experience dedicated to customer experience and people-centered design, Keller is an advocate for designing intuitive and meaningful, end-to-end experiences with business impact in the financial services and insurance sector. Keller has presented at UxPA, IxDA, Service Design Network (SDN) Conferences and has written for UX Matters, Communication Arts and SDN’s Touchpoint Journal.
“House and Senate Democrats have repeatedly fought for bigger checks for the American people, which House and Senate Republicans have repeatedly rejected — first, during our negotiations when they said that they would not go above $600 and now, with this act of callousness on the Floor,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in a statement Thursday.
Democrats will try again with a roll call vote on a new bill Dec. 28, when the House also plans a vote to override Trump’s veto on the National Defense Authorization Act. Since current government spending runs out that day — and funds for the rest of the fiscal year are included in the virus relief bill Trump criticized and hasn’t signed -- the House could also pass another stopgap measure to avert a partial government shutdown.
Republicans on Thursday tried to seek unanimous consent on a measure to examine taxpayer money spent on foreign aid, but Democrats blocked that move. In his complaint Tuesday about Congress’s combined virus aid and government spending bill, Trump criticized federal resources spent on international programs, even though that spending was allocated as part of the bipartisan appropriations process.