This is a decisive first step before its consideration in the Senate. After hours of debate, the American House of Representatives approved Saturday February 27 the vast stimulus plan of 1,900 billion dollars (1,573 billion euros) wanted by Joe Biden thanks to the votes of the Democrats alone.
Time is running out to support the world’s largest economy, hit hard by the Covid-19 pandemic. And the new Democratic president initially wanted to see his “American rescue plan” adopted at the beginning of February. Faced with the delay, he urged Congress this week to “Fast forward”.
The bill was adopted overnight in the lower house by 219 votes, all Democrats, against 212 (including two Democrats), the Republicans denouncing measures too expensive and poorly targeted. “The text is approved”, said the Democratic Speaker of the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, shortly after 2 a.m., to the applause of her group.
The text will be sent to the Senate next week, where the measure providing for an increase in the minimum income – up to $ 15 an hour, by 2025 – should be withdrawn. Confident, the Democrats are counting on their tiny majority in the Upper House so that it in turn is approved.
The final version of the text will then return to the House of Representatives, where the Democratic leaders said on Friday that they had enough votes for the stimulus plan to be adopted definitively, with or without an increase in the minimum wage. “We must approve this plan before March 14”, when the payment of prolonged unemployment benefits in a previous aid plan ceases, warned the majority leader, Steny Hoyer.
“Waste”
“After a year of pandemic and economic crisis, Americans need to know that their government is acting for them. And that as President Biden said: “Help is coming” “, had launched Nancy Pelosi before the vote.
Opposite, the Republicans denounced a titanic plan which does not “Than throw money down the drain”. “But will it help people get back to work?” No “, accused Republican minority leader Kevin McCarthy. “Democrats are so ashamed of all the waste of money unrelated to Covid in this text that they are passing it through the middle of the night”, he continued.
It is an unknown figure in Congress who had shaken up the progress of this massive plan on Thursday evening. The guardian of the complex procedures of the Senate, Elizabeth MacDonough, ruled that the text could not include the increase in the minimum hourly wage enshrined in the bill.
If some progressives were indignant, calling for overstepping the judgment of this “Parliamentarian”, an unelected official, Joe Biden let it be known on Thursday evening that he “Respected”. While announcing that he would attempt to separately advance the increase in the federal minimum wage, currently at $ 7.25 an hour. A route also anticipated Friday evening by the Democratic leaders of Congress. “It is inevitable, in the eyes of all of us, to reach the minimum wage of 15 dollars”, insisted Nancy Pelosi in the hemicycle, promising to work there “Actively”.
In detail, the Biden plan provides for tens of billions of dollars for the acceleration of the pace of vaccinations and the deployment of tests, but also $ 130 billion to help schools and high schools to reopen despite the pandemic. New aid checks in the amount of $ 1,400 are expected to be sent to Americans, depending on their income level, and unemployment benefit payments extended until September 30, 2021.
