US Senator Bernie Sanders, who as the new chairman of the Senate Budget Committee will draft the final $ 1.9 trillion coronavirus bill, said on Sunday that direct payments of $ 1,400 should go to Americans who earn $ 75,000 or less.
Sanders, I-Vt., Rejected proposals to restrict full payments to those earning $ 50,000, which was part of a plan to prevent wealthier taxpayers from receiving a share of the money. According to the original proposal, checks could go to families earning $ 300,000 or more.
“When people said, we don’t want the rich to get that benefit, I understand that,” said Sanders on CNN’s State of the Union. “And what we need to do is have a strong cliff, so that it doesn’t splash for people who earn $ 300,000.
“But to tell a worker in Vermont or California or anywhere else that if you are earning $ 52,000 a year, you are too rich to receive that aid, the full benefit, I find that absurd.”
Sanders said the limits should be $ 75,000 for individuals and $ 150,000 for couples, just as in the first two rounds of stimulus checks signed by President Donald Trump. Those who earn less than $ 100,000 and couples who earn less than $ 200,000 receive lower payments based on income.
“It is also, from a political point of view, a little absurd that you would have, under Trump, these people receiving the benefit, but, under [President Joe] Biden, who is fighting hard for the working class in this country, they would not get the full benefit, ”said Sanders.
“From a political point of view, it is absurd to say to the working class people, someone who has a decent union job, that they are earning $ 55,000, $ 60,000, sorry, you are not eligible for the program. It doesn’t make sense to me, nor do I think it makes sense to the American people. “
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Congress passed a budget resolution last week to trigger a parliamentary maneuver known as reconciliation, which would avoid obstruction in the Senate and allow Democrats to pass the stimulus bill without any Republican vote.
Although Biden talked about working with Republicans on the bill, US Senator Bill Cassidy, R-Louisiana, said that was not the case, citing the president’s rejection of his proposed $ 618 billion alternative spending package and nine other Senate Republicans as too small.
“The government is showing very clearly that it doesn’t care if it has to work with us,” said Cassidy on NBC’s Meet the Press program. “We arrived in good faith with at least 10 or more who would join us, and they say they don’t care. So, you got it. It takes two to dance the tango. At the moment, I’m not sure if we have both to dance the tango. “
Senate Republicans noted that previous stimulus projects were approved with overwhelming bipartisan support. But that only happened after Republican senators tried and failed to pass their own bills without any Democratic priority, demanded that any legislation protect companies from lawsuits if employees or customers were infected with COVID-19 and increased taxpayer subsidies. for religious schools and other private schools. Nor did Republicans negotiate with Democrats in Congress after the House passed two trillion-dollar stimulus measures.
Biden and other Democrats have insisted on the larger number, noting that a very small stimulus package in 2009, purposely kept lower to attract Republican support, hampered the country’s economic recovery after the Great Recession.
Lawrence Summers, who was President Barack Obama’s Treasury secretary, suggested that the $ 1.9 trillion package could unleash “inflationary pressures of a kind that we haven’t seen in a generation.” New Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen on CNN responded that her concern about inflation needed to be left behind in relation to concerns about not spending enough money to fix the economy.
“My predecessor indicated that there is a chance that this will cause inflation to rise. And this is also a risk that we must consider, ”said Yellen. “And I can tell you, we have the tools to deal with that risk if it materializes. But we face an enormous economic challenge here and enormous suffering in the country. We have to resolve this. This is the biggest risk. “
Recent studies by S&P Global and the Brookings Institution said that a $ 1.9 trillion package would return the economy later this year to what it was before the pandemic. And Moody’s Analytics said the plan would help create 7.5 million jobs this year and another 2.5 million next year, fully recovering all jobs lost due to the coronavirus.
The Republican alternative also left out Biden’s $ 350 billion federal aid proposal to help state and local governments pay salaries for first responders, teachers and other public officials. This has been one of the top Democratic priorities.
Cassidy, who last year joined New Jersey Democrat Robert Menendez in bipartisan legislation to provide that help, said on NBC that there was less support for assistance this time, considering New Jersey’s revenue loss was just 0, 5%, New York’s was 1.5% and the average drop was 0.1%.
“It is difficult to build political consensus when there is only a 0.1% drop in revenue,” said Cassidy. “Some people will scratch their heads and say, ‘This is not justified. Let’s think of a different way of doing this’ ”.
Jonathan D. Salant can be contacted at [email protected].
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