The NPR Politics Podcast - Relief Will End If Congress Can't Pass A Deal

Episode Date: December 2, 2020

Millions of Americans rely on various relief measures to stay afloat during the pandemic, much of which is set to expire at the end of the year if Congress fails to extend it.Read More: - Millions Face Bitter Winter If Congress Fails To Pass Relief Deal - Bipartisan Group Pushes $908B COVID-19 Plan, But McConnell Crafts Bill Trump Will SignThis episode: correspondent Asma Khalid, congressional reporter Claudia Grisales, and chief economics correspondent Scott Horsley.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

Hi, this is Bill calling from Jonesboro, Arkansas, and I'm getting ready to ride my bike to the polls and vote in our local runoff election. This podcast was recorded at 1230 p.m. Eastern Time on Wednesday, December 2nd. Things may have changed by the time you hear this, but I will have voted and ridden my bike back home. Here's the show. More elections. It never ends. And a good bike, though. Hey there, it's the NPR Politics Podcast. I'm Asma Khalid. I'm covering the Joe Biden transition. I'm Claudia Grisales. I cover Congress. And I'm Scott Horslake. I cover the economy. So, Claudia, we are now once again going to be talking about coronavirus relief talks.

I mean, there's not a lot of time left on the clock for Congress to act. We're going to talk about this in a bit, but there is really, frankly, like a severe economic cliff that a lot of people are facing if Congress does not act before the end of the year. So, yes, there's only a few days left for Congress to be in session. They're scheduled to be here this week and again next week. It's possible they will extend that if they don't reach a deal on this. They're also facing a fiscal cliff. The government's going to run out of money on the 11th. And so they need to fund the government again. And one proposal is to try and get that COVID relief attached to that bill. That all said, the negotiations are ongoing, but there's only a few days left that we can tell that they can get this done in.

And Scott, this is, you know, really important to frankly, millions of people, because you've done some reporting on this. You know, there are to frankly, millions of people, because you've done some reporting on this. You know, there are certainly relief packages, whether we're talking about student loan debt relief, you know, eviction relief that is going to end by the end of the year if Congress doesn't do anything. That's right. And we're in this really interesting point in the pandemic where we can see a light at the end of the tunnel. We've been getting this really encouraging vaccine news, which suggests the economy could be in a much better place this spring or summer. But in the meantime, we've got a really cold, dark winter ahead of us. And

for a lot of people, that could be a particularly perilous time, especially the people who've lost their jobs and are not likely to get those jobs back anytime in the immediate future. There are millions of Americans who've been counting on emergency unemployment benefits that Congress authorized back in the springtime, and those benefits are due to run out the day after Christmas. One of the people who's been counting on those benefits is Annalise Monkman. She lives in Bangor, Maine, and she's going to be in a world of hurt if that money runs out with no help from Congress. You're looking at families who are trying to teach their kids from home and feed them on very little money and then are not going to have things like heat. And here that could be,

you know, life-threatening. You know, we have seen job growth slowing every month since the middle of the summer. We're going to get the November jobs numbers on Friday. But just this morning, we got data on private payrolls, which was kind of disappointing. Unemployment claims have been growing for the last couple of weeks. So it's really a perilous time right now. And there really is economic incentive for Congress to do something. And Scott, it's not just unemployment assistance. I mean, you've been talking to people who are, you know, going to lose other potential benefits at the end of the year if Congress doesn't pass an additional stimulus bill. That's right. There

have been some protections for people who are renting and might be facing eviction. Those protections have not been perfect, but they have helped stave off eviction for some families. And certainly putting people out of their apartments in the midst of a pandemic is not ideal for been perfect, but they have helped stave off eviction for some families. And certainly, putting people out of their apartments in the midst of a pandemic is not ideal for public health, especially in the midst of the winter. So there's that. Student loan deferments are set to run out. All of these things were authorized by Congress in the early weeks of the pandemic, when lawmakers really did move aggressively to provide a support system for struggling Americans, the economy has recovered partway from that deep hole we were in

in the springtime, but there's still a long way to go. And so, you know, a lot of economists have been saying there's a need for lawmakers to extend those protections, to extend that lifeline for a few more months till we can get to that point where the vaccine is widely available and the economy can really open up again. You know, Claudia, given the economic picture that Scott's painting, do you feel like there is increased bipartisan recognition of just how dire some people's economic situations are at this point? You know, what Scott's painting is a picture that's affecting millions of people. And do you feel like there is recognition now from both Republicans and Democrats that they need to act

quickly? Most definitely. There is that acknowledgement that circumstances are getting more dire by the day. And I think this is why we're seeing the largest bipartisan push on this. They're getting very concerned that they could leave for the holidays and leave all of these individuals hanging. And so that is the threat that they are looking at right now. I'm hearing it from Republicans who are taking to the Senate floor just this week, and Democrats who I spoke to after this unveiling of a bipartisan proposal yesterday, who are really worried about leaving right now and not coming back until next year with no deal in hand, and only these circumstances getting more dire by the day. Yeah, Virginia Senator Mark Warner, who's one of the sort of centrist lawmakers behind that bipartisan proposal, said yesterday it would be stupidity on steroids for lawmakers to go home for Christmas without taking action on this.

And yet, for all the urgency that lawmakers have been giving lip service to, they don't seem really ready to make a deal. This is really frustrating for people like April Kinzinger. She lives near Dayton, Ohio. She's also out of work. She's been scraping by on emergency unemployment benefits. And it really bothers her to watch what's happening or what's not happening here in Washington. I think normal people sitting here watching the television screen are pretty sick and tired of seeing both sides fighting over kind of arbitrary things when we're unable to make our car payments, when we're unable to put

food on the table. It seems a lot like they're fighting over political stuff when we just need to be able to feed our kids. Claudia, it feels like people that Scott has been talking to are frustrated by the politics of this all. And yet there are, you know, real economic concerns that people have, whether it's about unemployment assistance, or evictions. And, you know, do you have a sense that this bipartisan push on the Hill is a, you know, realistic? And B, is it addressing things like the unemployment assistance or evictions that are going to be very tangible for people in just a few weeks? Yes, this bipartisan move is definitely ramping up the pressure on leaders. And although that proposal in particular is not expected to get very far, it could feed into a final deal. And that final

deal will probably, if it does happen, have elements from Republicans and Democrats that do try and address some of these pieces. For example, Republicans are very focused on this popular paycheck protection program to help small businesses. Meanwhile, Democrats are very focused on aid for state and local governments, as well as addressing school aid. And Republicans are on board with that. So there is some overlap. And in order for them to reach a deal, my expectation is if they do, it will be addressing a lot of these dire concerns that we keep hearing about.

All right. Well, let's talk more about the political dynamics of all of this after a quick break. Mitch McConnell has spent decades making sure there is more money in politics, not less. Why? We do it because we'd like to win. But all along, one person opposed him on this. Someone in his own party. There's too much money washing around. And this money makes good people do bad things and bad people do worse things.

McConnell versus McCain on NPR's Embedded Podcast. And we're back. And Claudia, you know, we talked a lot before the break about this bipartisan proposal. So why don't you help us understand, like, what are the realistic options on the table? Because this sounds like this bipartisan proposal doesn't really have the support of leadership. So are there alternatives? Yes. So McConnell, soon after this group of bipartisan lawmakers pushed out their proposal, McConnell quickly said a few hours later that he was talking to his colleagues, he was talking to the White House about a deal that President Trump would sign. So that was the emphasis there. Let's not waste time here in terms of messaging projects is kind of how he framed this bipartisan proposal.

Let's look at what we can get through Congress and signed by President Trump. And McConnell's framework, he released it yesterday. It's very similar to one that was released earlier this year by McConnell and other Senate Republicans. It is a roughly $500 billion program. It would direct about $330 billion to small businesses, including the Popular Paycheck Protection Program, $105 billion for schools, and then $31 billion for vaccine distribution, therapeutics, medical supplies. By comparison, when you look at this bipartisan proposal, that was a $908 billion deal. So once again, we're looking at some significant gaps in terms of these proposals. If you want to kind of look at the broad buckets, I mean, all the proposals include some renewal of the Paycheck Protection Program, which is the forgivable loans for small business.

All the proposals include some extension of unemployment insurance, although there's, as I said, there's a wide range of how generous those proposals are. The big thing that the Democrats want that the Republicans are dug in against is aid to state and local governments. The big thing that Republicans want that Democrats aren't too in against is aid to state and local governments. The big thing that Republicans want that Democrats aren't too crazy about is legal protection for businesses against COVID-related lawsuits. And those broad outlines have been unchanged for months now. I mean, those are sort of the positions that the various parties have staked out. The bipartisan plan was designed to give everybody a little of what they wanted and give

nobody everything they wanted. You've got the Senate Republicans and the White House more or less dug in where they've been all along. And we've got Democrats at least saying what they've wanted all along, although they're also talking about some new proposal, which they haven't spelled out. And we don't really know what's in that and how much ground they're willing to give. And all of this is happening at a really unusual moment, which is Congress is approaching this lame duck session, and on top of it, it's happening during a presidential transition period, right? And you were in Delaware yesterday where we heard from the president-elect about what he wants to see.

That's right, Scott. He know, he did stress the urgency of the moment. Right now, the full Congress should come together and pass a robust package for relief. You know, so he's talking about the fact that he wants Congress to do something now. But then he went on to say that anything that's passed during the lame duck session would be at best just a start. And that he's actually already begun to instruct his transition team to work on putting forward the proposals that they will put to the next Congress around how to handle coronavirus and economic relief and outlined a whole bunch of things he wants to see, you know, like expanded aid to states and local municipalities. And, you know, when he was vice president in the Obama administration, Joe Biden was famous or infamous, depending on your point of view, for striking kind of half a loaf deals with Mitch McConnell. Maybe this is sort of his way of saying to Democrats in Congress, let's take half a loaf now, get something. And then when I'm in the White House, we'll come back and take another swing at it.

Though I will point out, as of yesterday, Biden was asked if he's spoken with Mitch McConnell, and he had not as of yesterday. Yesterday, I spoke to Senator Chris Coons, a key Biden ally here, and he said he didn't sign on to the bipartisan proposal, for example, because he didn't want to send the wrong signal that the new administration is on board. But at the same time, he wants to be clear, this is a deal that has to be worked out in Congress. And there's only one president at a time. And they need to deal with the cards they were dealt and try to get something done with Trump for now. You know, Claudia, there are specific deadlines by which Congress needs to act.

So what are you watching for? So the next few days are going to be key. The passage of a new government funding bill that could have this COVID relief bill attached is going to be something I'm going to be watching very closely that needs to be done by December 11th. We spoke to Senator Richard Shelby yesterday. This is the chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee. And he said if they don't reach some sort of overall funding deal, they may have to do a temporary stopgap measure by next Wednesday. And so the next few days are going to be critical if they can get on the same page when it comes to this relief and whether they

can attach it to this overall funding measure. All right. Well, that is a wrap for today. Scott, thank you, as always, for joining us on the pod. Great to be with you all. I'm Asma Khalid. I cover the Biden transition. I'm Claudia Grisales. I cover Congress. And thank you all for listening to the NPR Politics Podcast.