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WASHINGTON / PALM BEACH, FLORIDA (REUTERS) – Democrats in the United States Congress on Monday (Dec. 28) will try to push expanded pandemic aid payments of US $ 2,000 (S $ 2,655) for Americans after the President Donald Trump will back down in a fight with lawmakers. that the federal government could have shut down.
In a sudden turnaround late on Sunday (December 28), Trump signed into law a $ 2.3 trillion pandemic aid and spending package, which returned unemployment benefits to millions of Americans and provided funds to support operating government agencies.
Trump, who leaves office on January 20 after losing the November election to President-elect Joe Biden, withdrew from his threat to block the bill, which was approved by Congress last week, after it was pressured by legislators from both sides.
The Republican president, who played golf on Sunday and remained out of the public eye even as a government crisis loomed, last week called the bill a “disgrace” and demanded that Congress change it to increase the size. of stimulus checks for struggling Americans from $ 600 to US. $ 2,000 while also cutting some other expenses.
It was not immediately clear why Trump, who has refused to admit defeat to Biden, changed his mind about the stimulus package. His surprise last-minute resistance had threatened to inject more chaos into the final stretch of his presidency.
Despite that, Democratic lawmakers who have a majority in the House of Representatives and have long wanted relief checks of $ 2,000 hope to use a rare point of agreement with Trump to promote the proposal, or at least put Republicans against it. a vote on Monday.
Many of Trump’s fellow Republicans are opposed to the higher payouts, and Trump may not have the clout to change them.
The issue seems unlikely to gain traction in the Republican-controlled Senate.
Many economists agree that the financial aid in the bill should be higher for the economy to move again, but say immediate support is still urgently needed for Americans affected by the coronavirus lockdowns.
After signing the bill behind closed doors at his beachside club in Florida, Trump sought to put the best face on his descent, saying he was signing it with “a strong message that makes it clear to Congress that the articles of waste must be eliminated. “
“Much more money is coming,” he insisted in a statement, although he did not provide anything to back up this promise.
With less than a month in office, Trump is unlikely to get his fellow Republicans to endorse the extra money for the people or persuade Democrats to accept spending cuts that he says he wants in other parts of the spending bill. , particularly in foreign aid.
Bitter holiday
Unemployment benefits that are paid to about 14 million people through pandemic programs expired last Saturday, but will restart now that Trump has signed the bill.
The package includes $ 1.4 trillion in spending to fund government agencies. Had Trump not signed the legislation, it would have started a partial government shutdown on Tuesday that would have put the incomes of millions of government workers at risk.
Democrats had accused Trump of compounding the coronavirus-related difficulties by delaying the bill.
Americans are going through a bitter Christmas season with a pandemic that has killed nearly 330,000 people in the United States and a daily death toll now repeatedly exceeding 3,000, the highest since the pandemic began.
The aid package also extends a moratorium on evictions that was due to expire Thursday, updates support for small business payroll, provides funding to help schools reopen and aid for the transportation industry and vaccine distribution.
Global stock prices rose in response to news that Trump had signed the stimulus plan and pulled out of a public spending crisis.
Futures for the US S&P and Japan’s Nikkei Index were up about 0.4 percent, and spot gold prices were up nearly 1 percent.
Also Monday, lawmakers will seek to overturn Trump’s recent veto on a $ 740 billion bill that sets policy for the Department of Defense. If successful, it would be the first override of Trump’s presidential veto.
Trump said he vetoed the legislation, which has been passed every year since 1961, because he opposed liability protections for social media companies unrelated to national security and did not want to rename military bases to generals. who fought for the pro-slavery Confederacy during the Civil War.
Although his previous eight vetoes were upheld thanks to Republican support, advisers said it was likely to be overridden. The bill was approved by both houses of Congress with margins greater than the two-thirds majorities that would be necessary to override the president’s veto.
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