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WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Americans faced the prospect of a government shutdown during a pandemic on Wednesday when outgoing President Donald Trump, angry at his fellow Republicans in Congress, demanded dramatic changes to a coronavirus aid package and government funding. of 2.3 trillion dollars.
The package, which includes $ 892 billion for relief from the coronavirus crisis, was approved by both houses of Congress on Monday after months of negotiations between Republicans and Democrats.
It also pays for government operations through September 2021, so if Trump blocks it, much of the US government will start shutting down next week for lack of funds.
Trump, in a video posted to social media Tuesday night, surprised some of his closest officials by demanding that lawmakers change the bill to include payments of $ 2,000 to every American, more than triple the $ 600 per person provided.
A source familiar with the situation said attendees thought they had deterred Trump from the $ 2,000 lawsuit last week. The video surprised even Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, who participated in the talks and endorsed the $ 600 figure.
Trump was upset when Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, the top Republican in Congress, last week acknowledged Democrat Joe Biden’s defeat of Trump in the November election, another source said. Biden will take office on January 20.
Trump did not explicitly say he would veto the measure, apparently in the hope that Congress would tweak a complex package that took months to negotiate. The White House had said Sunday that Trump would sign it into law.
Because Congress must suspend session at the end of the year, the bill will automatically be vetoed after 10 days if Trump takes no action, in what is known as a “pocket veto.”
Trump also demanded that the bill be stripped of foreign aid, which is included in all annual federal spending bills, and was requested by his own administration last year. He opposed other government activities funded by the 5,500-page bill, such as fish farming and funding for Smithsonian museums.
The Democratic-controlled House of Representatives and the Republican-controlled Senate passed the bill by wide bipartisan margins, and could return to Washington to override a veto if necessary.
DEMOCRATS SAY READY
Some Congressional Democrats, who had seen the aid package as too small a response to a crisis that has killed more than 320,000 Americans and put millions of people out of work, welcomed Trump’s move.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said the House could vote to increase those payments on Thursday if House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy agreed to do so.
“Mr. President, sign the bill to keep the government open! Urge McConnell and McCarthy to agree to the Democratic unanimous consent request for direct payments of $ 2,000! This can be done before noon on Christma’s eve!” she responded to Trump on Twitter.
The McConnell and McCarthy offices did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Trump’s demands put his fellow Republicans in an awkward position. Many of them opposed the $ 2,000 payments that Trump is now demanding as too expensive, and they would have to challenge their party leader or change their position on those payments.
“Let’s get this signed into law, and we can have an ongoing discussion about whether there should be additional direct payments or not,” Republican Sen. Pat Toomey said on Fox News.
Current federal funding will expire Monday if Trump does not sign the bill. He is scheduled to leave for Florida on Wednesday afternoon for the Christmas holidays.
A funding lapse would put millions of federal workers out of work and shut down wide swaths of the US government.At a time when it is rushing to distribute two coronavirus vaccines and facing a massive attack that officials attribute to Russia, but that Moscow denies.
Trump has also threatened to veto a $ 740 billion defense policy bill, which has been passed every year since 1961.
Trump doesn’t like that bill because it would remove the names of generals who served the pro-slavery Confederacy from military bases and it doesn’t repeal liability, non-defense-related, protections for social media companies like Twitter. and Facebook, which Trump considers hostile to conservatives. Like the same.
The House plans to return Dec. 28 if Trump vetoes the defense policy bill. That is the same day that government funding expires.
In Georgia, where control of the United States Senate hinges on a pair of runoff elections on January 5, Democrats pressured sitting Republican Senators David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler to say whether they agreed with Trump on that the $ 600 payments were too low. Neither campaign responded to a request for comment.
Trump triggered a record 35-day government shutdown two years ago when he rejected a federal spending bill on what he said was insufficient funds to build a border wall between the United States and Mexico.
(Information from Andy Sullivan and Steve Holland, additional information from Susan Heavey and Steve Holland; edited by Scott Malone and Alistair Bell)
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