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.
Heidi joined Arizent at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020. Previously, she was the special editions editor at real estate trade publication The Real Deal, covering residential and commercial markets in South Florida, Los Angeles and the metro New York area. Prior to TRD, she was features editor at hyperlocal New York news site DNAInfo, where she oversaw coverage of the city's residential real estate market. With a Bachelors of Science from the College of Communication at Boston University, Heidi majored in film and later worked for celebrated cinéma vérité documentarian Frederick Wiseman. She also did stints as film editor at Metro Newspaper and UsWeekly.
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Originally from Northern California, Ryan received bachelor's degrees in English and philosophy at UC Santa Barbara before beginning a career in journalism at the Santa Barbara Independent. After a few years of freelancing, bartending and snowboarding in Colorado, he moved to New York to earn a master's in journalism at Columbia University. Besides covering all things in financial advisor technology, Ryan has also written about music, sports, politics, art and entertainment.
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.