President Donald Trump signed a bill containing $900 billion in pandemic relief, the White House said, triggering the flow of aid to individuals and businesses and averting the risk of a partial government shutdown on Tuesday.
In addition to aid to stem the economic effects of the pandemic, the legislation Congress passed Monday also includes $1.4 trillion in government spending to fund federal agencies through the end of the fiscal year in September. The government had been operating on temporary spending authority that expires after the end of the day Monday.
Maria T. Vullo was confirmed by the New York State Senate as Superintendent Financial Services on June 15, 2016. She was nominated for the position by Governor Andrew Cuomo. As Superintendent, she is responsible for protecting consumers and markets in New York State from fraud and financial crises, as well as reforming the regulation of financial services to keep pace with the industry’s rapid evolution.
Prior to joining DFS, Ms. Vullo was a litigation partner at Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP, where she led civil, criminal, and regulatory investigations before courts and governmental authorities across the country. Ms. Vullo also served as Executive Deputy Attorney General for Economic Justice Division in the Office of the New York State Attorney General, under then New York State Attorney General Cuomo. There she oversaw the Bureaus of Investor Protection, Antitrust, Real Estate Finance, Consumer Frauds and Internet, leading investigations across New York State to protect investors and consumers from fraud.
Over the course of her career, Ms. Vullo’s specific legal experience has included litigations and investigations involving the financial services sectors and fraud, real estate, health care, insurance, tax, consumer protection, bankruptcy, antitrust, and constitutional law.
An accomplished trial lawyer, Ms. Vullo has also argued before the U.S. Supreme Court, the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the Second, Ninth, and Tenth Circuits, and the New York State Appellate Division.
Ms. Vullo is a recognized leader in protecting women’s rights, including representing women raped by soldiers during the 1992-1995 Bosnian War – a case in which she secured a $745 million jury verdict for the plaintiffs. Her pro bono work also includes securing a $100 million jury verdict representing abortion providers whose lives had been threatened by an online “hit list” and numerous amicus curiae briefs to the U.S. Supreme Court in significant civil rights cases.
Ms. Vullo was twice nominated by the New York State Commission on Judicial Nomination as a candidate for Associate Judge of the Court of Appeals. She has been named a “New York Super Lawyer” by Super Lawyers Magazine and has been included in numerous leading lawyer lists published by the National Law Journal and other leading publications.
Ms. Vullo recently received the New York Women Making a Difference Award from Eleanor’s Legacy, the Humanitarian of the Year Award from the Interfaith Nutrition Network, and the Distinguished Corporate Citizen Award from A Better Balance, among many other awards and professional recognitions.
Ms. Vullo earned her J.D. from New York University School of Law, an M.P.A. from the New York University Wagner Graduate School of Public Service, and a B.A. from the College of Mount Saint Vincent. She clerked for the Hon. John A. MacKenzie, U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Virginia, following law school prior to entering private practice.
McGuire is the director of health and benefit insurance operations for the Paychex Insurance Agency, a wholly owned subsidiary of Paychex, Inc.
Tom Beale is chief technology officer at Corax.
The combined $2.3 trillion package was the product of intense negotiations, from which Trump was largely absent until he surprised lawmakers of both parties by demanding bigger stimulus payments for individuals after the bill was already passed.
Trump said in the statement announcing the signing that the GOP Senate had agreed to vote on increasing the $600 individual payments and two other, unrelated matters dealing with social media and his unfounded allegations of voter fraud.
His delay in signing it means those aid payments will likely be later than Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin had promised and may cut a week from the supplemental unemployment benefits that were part of the package and scheduled to end in March.
The virus relief package will likely be the last major legislation signed by Trump, whose re-election hopes were dashed in large part due to his handling of the pandemic.
President-elect Joe Biden has said he will push for even more stimulus after taking office early next year, but it remains unclear whether Republicans in Congress would go along. Control of the Senate will be determined by the outcome of two runoff elections in Georgia on Jan 5.
Lawmakers approved the government funding and additional relief at the last possible moment before they were set to leave Washington for a year-end break. Business leaders have called on Congress to pass more stimulus for months, saying that restaurants, theaters, mom-and-pop stores and airlines were being decimated by closures and restrictions as Covid-19 cases spiked in the U.S.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer announced a relief deal on Sunday after more than a week of frantic talks sparked by a bipartisan group of senators who drafted their own compromise proposal and urged their leaders to act. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, representing the administration, also was involved in the talks.
Trump surprised even his fellow Republicans on Tuesday by tweeting a video saying that he wanted Congress to increase the size of stimulus payments for individuals to $2,000, from the $600 in the bill Congress passed. He also complained about federal spending on foreign aid and international programs, even though those funds were allocated as part of the bipartisan appropriations process for funding the government.