Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell laughed Tuesday when asked if he expected Congress to pass the coronavirus relief legislation by the end of next week, when the improved unemployment benefits will expire for around 30 millions of Americans who were laid off from the pandemic-induced economic pandemic. crisis.
“No,” McConnell said after letting out what Political Journalist Jake Sherman, who posed the question, described it as “a great laugh.”
The $ 600 per week increase in unemployment benefits provided under the CARES Act has served as a lifeline for tens of millions of laid-off Americans and a significant cushion for the United States economy.
For weeks, economists and lawmakers have warned that letting benefits lapse, even for a short period of time, could have devastating effects on those on the brink of financial ruin. According to Census Bureau data, as of July 7, more than 13 million Americans living in rental housing were behind on rent payments.
“I have a bill to renew supercharged unemployment benefits until this crisis is over so that families can continue to pay rent and buy groceries,” Senator Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) Tweeted Tuesday. “Senate Republicans have had every opportunity to pass it and have refused to do so.”
While enhanced unemployment benefits officially expire on July 31, on a Friday, in effect, weekly payments of $ 600 will end on Saturday, July 25 or Sunday, July 26, the days that states will send the last reinforced checks .
“Thirty million workers won’t be able to pay the rent on August 1 and McConnell is laughing,” said Wyden spokeswoman Ashley Schapitl.
Bobby Kogan, a mathematician on the Senate Budget Committee, tweeted that “there is no excuse” for allowing the enhanced benefits to expire.
“We had months to do this, and the House passed its bill in May,” Kogan wrote. “Tens of millions of people will be hurt by the arrogant inaction of Senate Republicans.”
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (Democrat of California) laughed Tuesday when a CNN The journalist asked if Congress could reach an agreement on the coronavirus relief legislation by the end of this week, an even more daunting timeline than the one he put forward for McConnell, given the deep divisions that are stirring up Senate and Republican Republicans. White House, not to mention fundamental disagreements between the Republican Party and its Democratic counterparts.
“The end of the week? You mean the month,” Pelosi replied. “I hope the month ends.”
In May, the Democrat-controlled House passed legislation proposing to extend the $ 600 per week increase in unemployment insurance (UI) until January of next year.
In an interview on Tuesday night with CNNWolf Blitzer’s Pelosi said Republicans “have had plenty of time to think about this and this delay is unnecessary because, in late July, unemployment benefits will expire … a moratorium on evictions will expire, many things will expire that are addressed in our legislation. “
the Washington Post It reported Tuesday that negotiations over the aid bill “will likely run until August,” leaving both houses with little time to pass the legislation before the summer recess. Pelosi said last week that she would be “absolutely” willing to cancel recess to pass aid legislation; McConnell has not said the same thing.
“Republicans appear to be gravitating toward a proposal on what to do about expiring unemployment benefits,” he added. Send reported. “The Democrats have proposed extending those benefits until January, but the White House and some Republicans now want to reduce the additional benefits to around $ 200 per week. However, the Democrats have not accepted this.”
During a private meeting on Monday, according to the Send“Trump criticized the improved unemployment benefit, saying it should never have been agreed in the first place.” Trump administration officials and Republican lawmakers have repeatedly characterized boosted unemployment payments as “disincentives” to work.
Ernie Tedeschi, a former Treasury Department economist, noted in a series of tweets Tuesday that, contrary to the narrative fueled by the Republican Party and the White House, “there is no evidence in the data that the emergency UI has been a net burden on the labor market so far. “
Allowing the benefits to expire, Tedeschi warned, “would be devastating for individual families, as well as for regional economies as a whole.”
