The NPR Politics Podcast - 5,593 Pages: Congress Strikes Spending/COVID Deal

Episode Date: December 21, 2020

From direct payments for American households to mass transit, the Congressional relief package contains money for individuals and institutions affected by the coronavirus pandemic.This episode: political correspondent Scott Detrow, White House correspondent Tamara Keith, congressional reporter Claudia Grisales, and health reporter Pien Huang.Connect:Subscribe to the NPR Politics Podcast here.Email the show at [e-mail] the NPR Politics Podcast Facebook Group.Listen to our playlist The NPR Politics Daily Workout.Subscribe to the NPR Politics Newsletter.Find and support your local public radio station.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

This is Elise from Phoenix, Arizona. I'm sitting here at my computer trying to figure out what to get my secret Santa this year, who just happens to be my mother. Hopefully I can figure that out soon because I need to get it shipped. This podcast was recorded at... I think a secondhand mention in a timestamp is the greatest present of all. It is 2... It's 2.10 Eastern on Monday, December 21st. Things may have changed by the time you hear this, but I'll still be wishing I was home for Christmas. Here's the show. Hey there, it's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Scott Detrow. I cover the Biden transition. I'm Tamara Keith. I cover the White House. And I'm Claudia Grisales. I cover Congress. And before we get into the news, I just want to say maybe folks in Phoenix do not appreciate this

as well as folks in colder, darker parts of the country. But today is the winter solstice. And that means from here on out, the days get longer again. It just gets brighter from here. Yay. And legislatively, maybe that's the case as well. That was not planned. After months of partisan stalemate and months of having the exact same conversation about it in this podcast, congressional leaders have reached an agreement on a nearly $900 billion COVID-19 relief package. As we speak, the bill has actually been printed. It is moving forward for votes. They have also come to an agreement on a big spending bill as well. Claudia, let's just start with this, though. Before we get into the politics, what does this deal mean for people out of work or seeing reduced income right now? We'll see a new round of direct payments to Americans worth up to $600 per adult and child. So a family of four could see $2,400 out of this plan. We should also expect a boost in weekly unemployment benefits of an extra $300 a week, and that should go from the end of this month through mid-March at this rate.

Okay. So those are two substantive things and two things that were a big part of discussion. It seems like there was a lot of resistance to bringing direct payments back. There really was. I remember early on during this latest wave of talks that we would hear members such as Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina say, if you add direct payments, the coalition will fall apart. And this is one of President Trump's biggest allies. But in the end, the payments won through. And part of that is that President Trump at least seemed to support the idea of direct payments. And some of his allies in Congress also did, which I think gave that a boost. And certainly, people like Bernie Sanders

wanted a bigger number, but there are direct payments in there, which is something that many Democrats wanted. So you've got those payments, you've got the increased in unemployment benefits, which really is probably the most important lifeline for a lot of people out there. What about aid for businesses? Because we've talked so much about the economy slowing down again and the restaurant, the entertainment industry, especially just really struggling through winter where it is harder to go eat outside like people were doing all summer and fall. Exactly. Yes, we're going to see $284 billion diverted to this popular Paycheck Protection Program, which issues loans for small businesses struggling during the pandemic. This was a key initiative for both parties. And this includes $12 billion

in loans targeted to reach minority businesses and those in low-income communities. And it also includes $15 billion for live venues, movie theaters, and then there's $16 billion for airlines, $1 billion for Amtrak. And it also provides a tax credit to employers that provide paid sick leave. Does this have more flexibility than last time? I know that the initial Paycheck Protection Program, you know, was targeted at keeping people on the payroll, but a lot of businesses are having trouble paying their leases and other, you know, insurance, other overhead, in addition to just payroll. Yeah, that is something that lawmakers are saying that

the Paycheck Protection Program will be more flexible in terms of working with it this time around. However, we heard this last time as well. And once that legislation is enacted, once these businesses are pulling these loans, that's when we would expect to hear more about whether they find it to be easier to use this time around or if they're hitting the same obstacles they saw before. Tam, President Trump, I mean, you could say this for a lot of things, legislatively throughout his four years in office and a lot of things, you know, when it comes to governing the country over the last month or so. But it was surprising,

even given that track record, given the crisis here, how how disengaged the White House was from all these negotiations. You know, the president hasn't met with Nancy Pelosi in how long? Claudia could probably help me figure that out. But it's been a very long time. Essentially, they had a brief interaction at the State of the Union address earlier in February, but that's about it. Yeah. And he has, you know, the president who came in as this great dealmaker has essentially left all the dealmaking to other people. And what you ended up with is this very weird scenario where you have the Treasury Secretary and the Chief of Staff up on Capitol Hill. This is, to have the Treasury Secretary negotiating a deal with Congress is not the normal course of business. And the reality is that, as far as I can tell, this is a congressional deal,

like so many other things during the Trump years. This is Congress, and President Trump is like, okay, sure, I'll sign that. That works. That's good enough. And then, Claudia, on that front, obviously, the pandemic has gotten a lot worse over the last month or so. The economy has slowed down again. But the economy was never doing well, and the pandemic never went away. And people have been out of work the entire year. So what was it that finally broke the stalemate that we've seen since midsummer on this? Yeah, that was a group of bipartisan members of Democrats and Republicans from both chambers, independent as well, that basically laid out their own plan. Can I add one other thing that changed?

It's one thing to say to the American people, we're going home for August recess and you're not going to have protection from ev, and you're not going to have protection from eviction, and you're not going to have extended unemployment benefits. But it's an entirely different thing to go home for Christmas break with that. And I think that, you know, this is the bare minimum of governing, keeping the lights on. And in the middle of a pandemic, when so many people are suffering, this deal is sort of the bare minimum of helping people in dire need. And they are doing it at the very last possible moment. All right, Claudia, thank you very much for joining us.

And thank you for being around for the conclusion of our 15,000 conversations about this particular round of relief. Definitely. Thanks. When we come back, we will talk vaccines and the politicians who are getting them. I'm Guy Raz, and on NPR's How I Built This, how Tim Ferriss, as an entrepreneur, author, investor, and podcaster, turned himself into a multi-million dollar brand. Subscribe or listen now. And we are back with Ping Huang of NPR's health team. Welcome back. Hey, thanks for having me again. So I've got to start since you've since you cover this much more than we do. Before we get into

vaccine distribution, there are some really scary headlines today about a new, more infectious strain of COVID-19 in the United Kingdom. We're seeing stories about the UK being sealed off from the rest of Europe to deal with this strain. What do we know about this? Yeah, so it can be really scary to hear. And I want to say a couple of things that I hope will be somewhat reassuring. So first, it's still a theory at the moment based on the fact that this version of the virus seems to be everywhere. And it's something that scientists are setting up experiments to test right now. And those results are probably not going to be available for a few weeks at least. The other thing about that,

too, is that even if it does turn out to be more transmissible, nobody here is saying that it's more virulent. So it's not more deadly or causing more sickness than any of the other versions that we know of so far. And the last phone a friend question I have for you before we dig into, you know, the political topic of this is obviously, as we're going to talk about, we're at the beginning of a worldwide vaccine drive. Is there any worry that the vaccine that we have developed and approved and distributed and started to give to people might not cover this new thing? Yeah. No. Oh, great. Great. All right.

Good. Awesome. Thank you. We'll just end it right there. The short answer is that the vaccines that we have are still expected to work against it. You know, the way that the Pfizer vaccine, the Moderna vaccine, they're both mRNA vaccines. And so the way they work is that they, you know, get into our systems and create antibodies that can actually tackle, you know, different parts of the spike protein. And so, you know, it's, they're expected to still be able to work against this particular mutation.

This is like the most reassuring conversation we've had about COVID in a while. I appreciate it. You can come back anytime. I'm glad to help. So I wanted to ask you about the thing that we were talking about in the first half of this podcast, which is this great, big legislative deal with lots and lots of money for lots and lots of things, including $69 billion for vaccines, testing and tracing. How does that mesh up with what the states need? So there was $20 billion in it to purchase vaccines and $8 billion for vaccine distribution. Now for that $20 billion for buying vaccines, that's, you know, to help the federal government fulfill its promise, which has, which is that they're going to try to make the vaccine free to anyone that wants one. And so far, they've pre-ordered hundreds of millions of doses from different drug companies. And this money is probably going to help pay for some of those deals. And it might also help them fund a deal

that the government is currently negotiating with the Pfizer, which is to purchase an additional 100 million doses of their vaccine early next year. And as for that $8 billion for vaccine distribution, that actually is around the amount that states have been asking for. You know, they've been saying, look, like you've invested billions of dollars into developing vaccines, getting them from, you know, concept into vials, but no money yet has been spent on getting it from vials into people's arms. And so, you know, states are saying this money is super urgently needed. They'll be using it to do things like hire and train a lot of people to give out those shots properly. They're really excited to be finally getting this money that they've been asking for for months for vaccine distribution.

We are just about exactly a week since the first shots started being given in the United States. Any sense after one week, how things are going, what some of the bright spots have been, what are the areas for improvement? State health officials are saying that it went pretty smoothly. About 3 million doses were shipped out last week, and about at least half a million people got their first shots. So one thing I want to say about vaccine distribution is that making sure that it's equitably distributed is a big concern. And people were saying that even in this first week, it's already been unequal. You know, the only healthcare workers that were really able to get access to it were employed by large

hospitals. Those who worked for smaller, more rural places weren't really able to get it. And so, you know, this week, 8 million more doses are getting shipped out. And included in that is actually a fair amount of Moderna vaccine. This is a new vaccine that was just approved on Friday. And it can be stored in normal freezer temperatures set out in smaller quantities. And it's going out to 3,500 sites this week. So the hope is that the Moderna vaccine can get out to more people in more rural places and help make this distribution more equitable. And in addition to health care workers, some of the first people to get these shots have

been high profile national leaders. Tam, we had House Speaker Nancy Pelosi post a picture of getting a shot. We had Vice President Mike Pence get a shot on live TV. Shortly after we taped this podcast today, the president-elect Joe Biden is going to get a shot on live TV. Shortly after we taped this podcast today, the president-elect Joe Biden is going to get a shot on live TV. What is the goal of making press conference out of these things? Well, so there's two things. One, these people are actually important for the continuity of government, and it would be best if they were protected from the coronavirus, which makes them a priority early on. And this

actually goes back to a 2016 memo from the Obama administration envisioning a scenario just like this. But the other reason is there is still a fair bit of vaccine skepticism out there. And if these very high profile people roll up their arms and say, I'm not afraid, you shouldn't be either. Hey, look, it's great. I trust it. You should trust it, too. That can help get the public excited or willing to be vaccinated.

And that's also why you see people across party lines signing up for this in a very public way. President Trump, of course, as we all remember, did get COVID in October. People across party lines signing up for this in a very public way. President Trump, of course, as we all remember, did get COVID in October. Is that why he has not been publicly vaccinated yet? The message coming from both the White House and President Trump is that, yeah, he had COVID in October and in theory has some remaining immunity from that experience. And therefore, yes, he wants to get a vaccine. Yes, he thinks everyone else should do it, but he doesn't feel like he should jump in line in front of other people

who may be at higher risk and don't have any of that residual immunity that he has from October. Yeah. All right. That is it for today. But Ping Wong from NPR's health team, thank you so much for joining us and for continuing to cover this never-ending, massive, massive story. Yeah, absolutely. Thanks so much for having me. Sure thing. I'm Scott Detrow. I cover the Biden transition.

I'm Tamara Keith. I cover the White House. Another, to be fair, massive, never-ending story. Indeed. Thank you for listening to the NPR Politics Podcast.