President Joe Biden highlighted the $ 1,400 payments for his $ 1.9 trillion coronavirus stimulus bill at a meeting at the White House on Friday, while senators worked until Saturday to pass a bill after a 10-hour delay in resolving a dispute that prevented approval.
Senate Republicans had previously planned to postpone the final vote on the bill as much as possible, offering dozens of amendments, but Democrats were responsible for the first assault while seeking to secure the support of US Senator Joe Manchin, DW .Va. , To extend unemployment insurance benefits.
Manchin finally agreed to support the $ 300 weekly benefit extension until September 6, below $ 400 in the House approved bill, and to forgive the federal income tax of up to $ 10,200 in unemployment insurance payments for those who earn less than $ 150,000.
“We have reached an agreement that allows the economy to recover quickly, while protecting those receiving unemployment insurance from being hit by unexpected taxes next year,” said Manchin in a statement after the deal was closed.
Biden quickly jumped on board.
“This agreement allows us to move forward on the American Rescue Plan urgently needed, with $ 1,400 aid checks, funding we need to finish vaccine implantation, open our schools, help those suffering from the pandemic and much more,” White House press Jen Psaki said in a statement.
The deal paved the way for the vote on the stimulus package to resume, with approval on the right track likely to be approved later on Saturday.
Democrats spent hours trying to come up with an acceptable alternative for Manchin so that he would not provide the deciding vote on an amendment by US Senator Rob Portman, R-Ohio, to cut payments from $ 400 to $ 300 and cut them in mid-2010. July, while taxing all unemployment benefits.
While Manchin crossed party lines to support Portman’s proposal, allowing approval by 50-49, the Democratic compromise would replace him. US Democratic senators from New Jersey, Cory Booker and Robert Menendez, voted against.
Republicans continued to insist that the rise in unemployment insurance encourages employees to stay at home. But studies by JPMorgan Chase & Co. Institute, economist Ernie Tedeschi and Yale University found that people prefer to return to their jobs, a conclusion also supported by Neel Kashkari, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis.
Before the stalemate began, the Senate rejected an amendment by US Senator Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., To restore the $ 15 federal minimum wage that parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough excised from the bill. The legislation is being analyzed under a procedure known as reconciliation, which allows approval by a majority of votes, but limits the type of provision that can be included in the legislation.
The amendment failed, 58-42. Booker and Menendez supported the salary increase.
“If any senator believes that this is the last time he will vote on whether or not 32 million Americans will be raised, he is sadly mistaken,” Sanders said after the vote. “We will continue to bring this up, and we will do it because it is what the American people demand and need.”
Although Senate Democrats tried to secure the support of all 50 lawmakers, Biden presented the stimulus checks to a paratransit worker, Navy veteran and health center volunteer, who joined him around a table at the White House .
Speaking to reporters at the start of the meeting, Biden said the money “would make a big difference in terms of life”.
“It will provide immediate relief for millions of people who will be able to use it in a very constructive way and also make the economy grow in the process,” he said.
The legislation includes payments of $ 1,400 for those who earn up to $ 75,000, eliminating them entirely for those who earn more than $ 80,000, and $ 2,800 payments for couples who make up to $ 150,000, ending them for those who earn more than $ 160,000.
These limits are below the $ 100,000 and $ 200,000 bill approved by the House approved project, and the Institute of Taxation and Economic Policy, a progressive research group, said the lower income limits would mean that 400,000 New Jersey residents unless they would receive stimulus checks.
Senate majority leader Chuck Schumer, DN.Y. said on Friday in his speech that, even with the lowest income limits, “the vast majority of Americans will receive all of the $ 1,400 that we ask for,” with legislation providing “direct checks for American workers and families struggling with the cost of groceries, medicine and rent.”
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Also on Friday, both advocates and opponents of the stimulus project took advantage of the United States’ Bureau of Labor Statistics, which reported that 375,000 new jobs were created last month.
Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky praised “a job report that has shaken expectations, almost doubling the job growth that experts expected to see”, while arguing in the Senate plenary against the stimulus bill.
But Psaki said the economy was still down 9.5 million jobs since the pandemic began a year ago.
“This is a bigger job gap than at any time in the Great Recession,” said Psaki at his daily news conference. “At this month’s pace, it will take us more than two years to reach pre-pandemic employment levels and even more at the average pace of the past three months.”
Studies by S&P Global and the Brookings Institution said that spending $ 1.9 trillion 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 jobs next year.
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Jonathan D. Salant can be contacted at [email protected]. Follow him on @JDSalant.