By Susan Cornwell and Steve Holland
Donald Donald / Pallum Beach, Fla. (Reuters) – Democrats in the U.S. Congress will try to push through an extended $ 2,000 epidemic relief payment for Americans after U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday withdrew from a fight with lawmakers that could shut down the federal government.
In a sudden reversal late Sunday night, Trump signed into law a 3 2.3 trillion epidemic and aid package, re-establishing unemployment benefits to millions of Americans and funding government agencies to continue.
Trump, who leaves office after losing the November 20 presidential election to Biden in the November election, withdrew from his threat to block the bill, which was approved by Congress last week, after he came under pressure from legislators from both parties.
The Republican president, who hit golf on Sunday and stayed out of the public eye despite a government crisis, called the bill “disgraceful” last week and called on Congress to increase the size of the check for Americans fighting from 600 to 2,000. While also cutting some other costs.
It was not immediately clear why Trump, who has refused to accept Biden’s defeat, changed his mind on the stimulus package. To his surprise, last-minute resistance threatened to cause more chaos in the final part of his presidency.
Still, Democratic lawmakers who have a majority in the House of Representatives and have long wanted a $ 2,000 relief investigation hope to use the rare agreement with Trump to move the proposal forward – or at least put Republicans on record against it – on Monday.
Many of Trump’s allies oppose the Republican paycheck, and Trump’s influence may not come to them. The issue is unlikely to get traction in the Republican-controlled Senate.
Many economists agree that the financial aid in the bill should be large to revive the economy but say there is an urgent need for aid for Americans hit by the coronavirus lockdown.
After signing a closed-door bill at his beachside club in Florida, Trump demanded to put the best face on his climb-down, saying he was “signing with a strong message that makes it clear to Congress that useless things Need to be removed. “
“A lot more money is coming,” he insisted in a statement, though he gave nothing to deliver on that promise.
With less than a month left in office, Trump is unlikely to give his fellow Republicans extra money for individuals or persuade Democrats to accept spending cuts, though he says he wants elsewhere in spending bills, especially in foreign aid.
Bitter Holiday
Nearly 14 million people are being paid unemployment benefits through epidemic programs on Saturday, but now the bill has been signed by Trump.
The package includes spending 1. 1.4 trillion to fund government agencies. If Trump had not signed the law, a partial government shutdown would have begun on Tuesday, putting the incomes of millions of government employees at risk.
Democrats accused Trump of exacerbating coronavirus-related troubles by holding the bill.
Americans are living in a bitter holiday season with an epidemic that has killed nearly 330,000 people in the United States and now has more than 3,000 deaths per day, the highest since the epidemic began.
The relief package also extends the moratorium on evacuations due to expire on December 1, supports small business parolees, provides funding to help reopen schools, and supports the transportation industry and vaccine distribution.
Global share prices have risen in response to news that Trump has signed a stimulus plan and withdrawn from the government spending crisis.
The US S&P Futures and Japan’s Nikkei index rose about 0.4%, and spot gold prices rose about 1%.
Also on Monday, legislators will try to override Trump’s recent veto of the policy of setting a 40 740-billion bill for the Department of Defense. If successful, it would be Trump’s first veto override of the president.
Trump said he vetoed the law, which has been passed every year since 1961, because he objected to the protection of liability for social media companies not related to national security and to military bases in the name of generals fighting for pro-slavery federalism. Didn’t want to change the name. Civil War.
Still, his previous eight vetoes thanked all Republicans for their support, with advisers saying this is likely to be an override. The bill passed both houses of Congress with a margin of more than the two-thirds majority required to rewrite the president’s veto.
(Reporting by Susan Cornwell in Washington Washington and Steve Holland in Palm Beach. Written by Matt Spatalnik. Edited by Kieran Murray)
