Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Wednesday closed off chances that the Senate would pass anytime soon a House bill that would give most Americans $2,000 stimulus payments.
The Kentucky Republican said the House legislation, approved in a bipartisan vote Monday, “has no realistic path” to quick passage in the Senate and that it falls short of the demands of President Donald Trump. He again blocked an attempt by Democratic leader Chuck Schumer to adopt the House bill to increase the payments to $2,000 from the $600 by unanimous consent.
Jason Tan is CEO of Sift Science.
Lynnette Kelly has been the Executive Director of the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board (MSRB) since June 2007.� Ms. Kelly leads the day-to-day management of the MSRB, a self-regulatory organization whose mission is to protect investors, municipal entities, and ensure a fair and efficient municipal securities market.� It does so by developing rules for municipal advisors who advise on issuance, securities firms and banks that underwrite, trade and sell municipal bonds, and by operating information systems, including the Electronic Municipal Market Access (EMMA) system, designed to promote transparency and investor access to information.� The MSRB also serves as an objective and expert resource and repository of municipal market information.Previously, Ms. Kelly was a managing director and associate general counsel at�the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association (SIFMA) (formerly The Bond Market Association), where she helped develop and implement legal, regulatory and best market practices in the fixed income markets, with a focus on municipal finance.�From 1990 to 1993, Ms. Kelly served as general counsel for the Municipal Assistance Corporation for the City of New York, and has worked at several law firms in New York City in all areas of municipal finance.�She graduated from the University of Nebraska in 1981 and from Tulane University School of Law in 1984.
Molly Mahoney is director for strategic technology and the disaster recovery coordinator at CNL Financial Group.
The Senate instead will work on combining the stimulus payments with measures on election integrity and rolling back social media liability protections, he said. That responds to all three issues Trump has said he wants, but a bill combining them likely will alienate enough senators in both parties to leave prospects for bigger stimulus payments dead in the Senate.
“The Senate is not going to be bullied into rushing out more borrowed money into the hands of the Democrats’ rich friends who don’t need the help,” McConnell said. The House bill would raise the income cutoff to receive a payment.
The clash over the payments also is entangling another piece of year-end business in the Senate — a vote to override Trump’s veto of a crucial $740.5 billion defense policy bill. Senators Bernie Sanders and Ed Markey said they will continue to delay the defense legislation vote unless McConnell relents and allows a vote on a standalone bill on the bigger stimulus checks.
“We are saying to Mitch McConnell, to allow the United States Senate to do what it’s supposed to do, and that is the vote,” Sanders told reporters. “The House passed the bill, it’s over here right now. Do you want to vote against it? Then vote against it.”
Pennsylvania Republican Senator Pat Toomey later blocked an attempt by Sanders to call up the House bill for a roll call vote.