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.
Ryan Frailich is the CFP, founder of Deliberate Finances, a fee-only financial planning practice that specializes in working with couples in their 30’s, as well as educators and nonprofit workers.
Prior to becoming a planner, Ryan was a teacher himself and then worked to grow a charter school organization as the Director of Talent & Human Resources. Given their age and occupations, student loans are a priority for the majority of his clients, so he’s spent many hours trying to find the right ways to provide clients with information about their student loan options. You can find him on Twitter, email him at ryan@deliberatefinances.com, or at basically any New Orleans festival featuring delicious food and drinks.
Diane Morais is the president of consumer and commercial banking at Ally Bank.
Steven Simpson is the senior director and head of data science at Cornerstone Advisors.
“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.