In the News

WASHINGTON – With the impeachment trial complete, the focus of Congress is squarely on a new coronavirus relief package, including a new round of checks to most Americans.

House Democrats moved ahead last week with crafting the details of President Joe Biden’s coronavirus relief plan, readying to pass a massive $1.9 trillion package that could send $1,400 checks to individuals and other aid to the nation as the prospects of a bipartisan deal fade.

The House Ways and Means Committee – which has jurisdiction over taxes as well as unemployment insurance and other benefits – passed its $940 billion part of the package on a party-line vote Thursday, with all of the panel’s Republicans opposed.

In addition to the $1,400 direct payments and billions in other spending, the sprawling plan would extend jobless benefits set to expire in March, boost funding for vaccination efforts and send most American parents monthly payments of $250 to $300 per child.

Republicans have panned the Democratic proposal as too costly and coming too soon after Congress passed a roughly $900 billion relief package Dec. 21 and called for a bipartisan approach. But with a trillion-dollar gulf between what the two parties appear willing to spend, Democrats are forging ahead through budget reconciliation, a process that lets them bypass the 60-vote supermajority needed to pass most legislation in the evenly divided Senate.

“I am deeply disappointed that the Biden administration and Congressional Democrats decided to ram through a partisan COVID relief package without any input from their Republican colleagues,” Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Spokane, said in a statement. “It is our responsibility as representatives to provide oversight and carefully evaluate the gaps in funding from previous relief packages to ensure we are sending additional money to the places that need it most. That work has yet to be done.”

Democrats counter that the December relief package, which extended $300-a-week unemployment benefits until March 14, was intended only as a stopgap measure.

“We knew we were going to have to pass another bill, that’s why we allowed the other one to go through,” said Rep. Kim Schrier, a Democrat whose district stretches from Wenatchee to the Seattle suburbs.

“This is a package that meets the need. We have parts of our population who’ve been particularly hard hit. They are the people who were already struggling … and they need a big hand up.”

Democrats also see Biden’s “American Rescue Plan” as a chance to address longstanding inequities the pandemic has only worsened. Rep. Suzan DelBene, a northwest Washington Democrat on the Ways and Means Committee, has spearheaded an overhaul of the Child Tax Credit to send monthly payments of $250 per child – and $300 for children under age 6 – to millions of families.

“This is a smart way to deliver relief during the pandemic to families struggling to make ends meet but also a good long-term policy that can lift millions out of poverty,” DelBene said in a statement.

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