If you’re confused by the back and forth of the newest stimulus bill, you aren’t alone. Many Americans are confused about the negotiations taking place between a bipartisan group and the White House.
THE STIMULUS BILL:
What Does the Bipartisan Group Want?
Mitch McConnell and Nancy Pelosi have been in discussions with other party leaders. Together, they have drawn a $908 billion coronavirus stimulus/relief bill. Their bill includes unemployment relief of $300 per week and $160 billion dollars of state and local government relief money. It also includes $228 billion dollars for paycheck protection programs.
Surprisingly, the bipartisan bill did not include any sort of direct payments to Americans, but it does include continued support of various unemployed programs as well as the extra $300 per week of unemployment benefits.
What Does the White House Want?
Steven Mnuchin, Secretary-Treasurer, and the White House proposed a counteroffer to the bipartisan stimulus bill. Their bill leaves out key unemployment benefits, but includes direct payments to Americans of $600 per person and per child. The White House bill cuts benefits to the unemployment but does extend benefits that are currently set to expire a the end of the year.
Breaking it Down.
Unofficially, Trump expressed interest in providing as much as $2,000 per person in direct payments, but that hasn’t been mirrored in any bill proposals. If any direct payment is approved, it would be the first since a March payment of $1,200 received by the general public. The unemployment benefits of the bipartisan backed proposal stack up to $180 billion dollars while the White House’s counter-offer provides $40 billion.
When it comes down to it, the White House and Secretary-Treasurer are interested in providing more money directly to businesses, paycheck protection, and individuals and the Bipartisan-backed less expensive alternative provides more relief to the unemployed.
THE DEFENSE BILL:
For the past sixty years, a defense bill has been passed with bipartisan support. This year, a year of firsts, there was quite a bit more skepticism surrounding the $731 billion defense bill.
Through the process of drafting, proposing, and debating the defense bill, Trump has issued multiple statements claiming he will veto the bill unless Section 230, which protects social media companies Facebook, Twitter, and others from liabilities concerning content. This comes after multiple spats with social media giants censoring the president’s posts and tweets around the time of the 2020 election, in which Joe Biden was elected. Content giants, like Twitter, have continued on-site fact-checking and censoring posts about election fraud, and Trump’s claims of election fraud.
Trump also claimed he would veto the bill if it included a passage to rename military installations named after members of the Confederacy.
On Tuesday, December 8th, the Defense Bill passed the House as-is 335-78. Though the bill passed, there is no assurance that if it’s vetoed by the president it will have enough votes by Congress to override that veto. There is a fair chance that republicans will back Trump’s veto, but the overwhelming passage of the bill indicates otherwise.
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