U.S. President-elect Joe Biden urges Donald Trump to sign a $ 892 billion COVID-19 funding and relief bill that will provide much-needed assistance to Americans hard hit by the virus and an economic downturn caused by the pandemic should.
In a written statement, Biden, who is due to take office on January 20, accused Trump of “relinquishing responsibility” that could have “devastating consequences”.
“It’s a day after Christmas and millions of families don’t know if they can make ends meet because President Donald Trump refuses to sign an overwhelming, bipartisan Congress-approved economic relief bill,” Biden said .
“This calculation is critical. It must now be legally signed. “
Trump’s refusal to sign the COVID-19 relief bill, passed this week after months of partisan fighting in the U.S. Congress, has raised concerns for millions of Americans who will lose special unemployment benefits at midnight on Saturday.
Coronavirus assistance, tied to the $ 1.4 trillion Funding Bill passed in the House and Senate this week, includes a one-time payment of $ 600 to U.S. citizens and expands on some pandemics Unemployment benefits and financial support.
The US has reported more than 18.7 million cases of COVID-19 and more than 330,000 deaths related to the virus since the crisis began. This comes from a record by Johns Hopkins University – the highest total number in the world.
“It’s a game of chess and we’re farmers,” Lanetris Haines, a self-employed single mother of three in South Bend, Indiana, who will lose her $ 129 weekly unemployment benefit, told The Associated Press.
Earl McCarthy, a father of four who lives in the US state of Georgia, said he has been unemployed since losing his sales job and will be out of income the second week of January if Trump doesn’t sign the bill.
“The whole experience was horrific,” McCarthy, who receives about $ 350 a week in unemployment insurance, told the AP.
“I shudder to think if I hadn’t saved anything or had an emergency fund in those five months, where would we have been?” he said.
“Measure 600 dollars”
Trump has said the one-time payment to Americans included in the legislation is too low.
“I just want to bring in our great people $ 2,000 instead of the meager $ 600 that is now on the bill,” Trump tweeted on Saturday morning.
He has not yet said whether he intends to veto the legislation and he may still sign it in the coming days.
I just want to bring in $ 2,000 for our great people instead of the paltry $ 600 that is on the bill now. Also, stop the billions of dollars in “pork”.
– Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 26, 2020
The Democrats tried Thursday to increase payments to the $ 2,000 per person Trump requested, but the President’s Republicans, who opposed the higher amount, stalled efforts.
The Democratically-controlled House of Representatives plans to vote this week on laws that will give individuals one-time checks valued at $ 2,000.
According to the US media, special unemployment benefits are expected to expire on Saturday due to delays in signing the COVID-19 Aid Act. Up to 14 million Americans were affected.
The COVID Relief Act would allow people to receive unemployment benefits and revive additional benefits for millions of people by March, the New York Times reported.
A partial government shutdown will begin Tuesday unless Congress can agree on government funding bill beforehand.
This renunciation of responsibility has devastating consequences. This calculation is critical. It must now be legally signed.
French Hill of Arkansas Republican lawmaker, who sits on the House Financial Services Committee, told Fox on Saturday he hoped Trump would sign the bill immediately.
“I wish he had pitched that $ 2,000 pitch as loudly in the past three weeks as it did after the bill passed. It could possibly have given us more leverage to get a slightly higher payment, ”said Hill.
At that point he added, “It will be extremely difficult to get this payment through the Senate and the House.”
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