The Trump administration made a new proposal on Tuesday, December 8, for a plan to help the American economy, hoping to be able to unblock a situation that has been bogged down for months and bring the Democratic and Republican parliamentarians into agreement, who are negotiating again.
“From the president [Donald Trump], I submitted a proposal for $ 916 billion [756 milliards d’euros] “, announced Tuesday at the end of the day, the Secretary of the Treasury, Steven Mnuchin, in a press release published on Twitter. The proposal was presented by Minister Donald Trump to Democratic Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi in an interview late Tuesday. The amount is a little higher than the $ 908 billion recently proposed by a small group of Democratic and Republican parliamentarians, which served as the basis for negotiations.
These discussions have stalled for months and had recently resumed. Future President Joe Biden himself insisted on the need to help the most vulnerable households and businesses to emerge from this situation, and to prevent the current economic crisis from becoming self-sustaining. It is only, for the elected president, a ” advance payment “, before a vast stimulus plan that could be presented soon after entering the White House on January 20.
Two points of disagreement
Discussions by elected officials of Congress still come up against two main points of disagreement: the protection of companies against certain lawsuits, in particular in the event of contamination of employees with Covid-19, defended by the Republicans, and aid to States and to local communities, demanded by the Democrats.
The White House proposal includes both subjects, which could allow the two camps to finally come to an agreement. The legal protection provided also concerns schools and universities.
To finance this proposal, the White House intends in particular to use an envelope of 140 billion dollars, released but not used for so-called PPP loans to small businesses, and 429 billion dollars of “Treasury fund”.
This offer does not provide a check to American households, unlike the first stimulus plan adopted in March, at the start of the pandemic. However, it contrasts with the remarks, earlier in the afternoon, of the Republican President of the Senate, Mitch McConnell, who had suggested to quickly approve the consensual subjects and to leave aside the two elements of controversy. No way, answered him the leader of the Democratic minority in the Senate, Chuck Schumer.
“Leader McConnell’s efforts to discredit bona fide bipartisan negotiations are hateful”, reacted, for her part, Nancy Pelosi in a statement, stressing that the discussions had made “Good progress” and calling for them to continue “Without McConnell’s obstruction”.
Congressional leaders hope to vote on measures by the end of next week. Time is running out, because Americans will soon find themselves without resources: the aid voted at the end of March as part of the gigantic stimulus plan of 2,200 billion dollars, the Cares Act, extended in April by 500 billion, expire the next day. of Christmas.