WASHINGTON -- With time running out, lawmakers on Sunday closed in on a proposed covid-19 relief bill that would provide roughly $300 in extra federal weekly unemployment benefits but not another round of $1,200 in direct payments to most Americans, leaving that issue for President-elect Joe Biden and the new Congress next year.
The $908 billion aid package to be released today would be attached to a larger year-end spending bill needed to avert a government shutdown this coming weekend.
The cash payments were popular when they were first distributed after the pandemic hit, and Biden on Friday had expressed hope that a second wave might come after weekend negotiations.
But senators involved in the talks said the checks won't be included as part of the compromise, even as Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and others said that could cause them to oppose the measure.
Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., indicated that excluding the checks while assuring small-business aid and renters' assistance was the only way to reach agreement with Republicans who are putting firm limits on the bill's final price tag.
"The $1,200 check, it cost we believe nationally $300 billion to give you an idea," he said on ABC's "This Week." "The Democrats have always wanted a larger number, but we were told we couldn't get anything through the Republicans, except this $900 billion level."
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The plan, spearheaded by two centrist senators, Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and Susan Collins, R-Maine, is being worked on by a group of Republican and Democratic senators. It is less than half of the Democrats' push of $2.2 trillion and nearly double the $500 billion "targeted" package proposed by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.
Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., agreed that a new round of direct checks "may be a go" at some point. "This is not a stimulus bill, it's a relief bill," he said on "Fox News Sunday." "And it's something for the next three to four months to help those in greatest need."
Both he and Durbin said that McConnell has shown interest in the bipartisan effort, and Cassidy said he was hopeful that President Donald Trump would embrace it as well.
"President Trump has indicated that he would sign a $908 billion package -- there's only one $908 billion package out there and it's ours," Cassidy said. "The pain of the American people is driving this and I'm optimistic that both of those leaders will come on board."
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., have endorsed using the bipartisan proposal as the basis for negotiations.
The proposal is expected to include about $300 per week in bonus federal unemployment payments, providing relief just as emergency aid payments at regular benefit levels are set to expire at year's end. It would extend a freeze on evictions for people who cannot pay their rent and reauthorize the Paycheck Protection Program to give a second round of subsidies to businesses struggling through the pandemic.
Still, potential sticking points remain.
Sanders and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., said last week they wouldn't support the $908 billion proposal if it did not include checks for families, and were joined by Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo. Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez are also against shielding businesses from lawsuits claiming negligence for covid-19 outbreaks, a provision pushed by Republicans.
Critics have said some companies, such as meatpacking plants, shouldn't be protected if there are indications they didn't take adequate precautions. Cassidy said small companies could be driven out of business just from the cost of the gathering and exchanging evidence.
Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., said on CNN's "State of the Union" that Sanders was not involved in the negotiations and "his characterization is just not accurate" about the potential liability protections for businesses. The direct payments, he said, will be a task for Biden.
Warner said neither side will "get the full amount or all the component parts that they wanted," but with the high number of virus cases and the end of aid from the earlier stimulus, it would be "stupidity on steroids if Congress doesn't act."
"There has to be some liability protection," Cassidy said, citing what he described as ambiguity about the need for mask-wearing from health experts early in the pandemic.
While favoring the $1,200 checks, Biden said the emerging compromise was "immediately needed" and that additional assistance could follow later.
Cassidy said that will depend on the vaccine and whether it's changing the trajectory of the pandemic. Durbin said once vaccines are being administered, Congress will have a "much better view of where we're going with this national pandemic."
"If the vaccine is being deployed and infection rates are falling, stores are reopening, small businesses are flourishing, we don't" need another spending bill, Cassidy said. "But if the infection rate continues to climb, we may."
Manchin, speaking on NBC's "Meet the Press," said the bipartisan group was focused on extending the most urgent aid for the next four months.
"Every indication says more money is needed; we see that," he said. "This gets us through basically the lifelines that people need and the small businesses that can survive and not go under."
Manchin said Biden's team, when in power, "can put together a different proposal that takes us further down the road for more recovery."
Information for this article was contributed by Hope Yen of The Associated Press; by Luke Broadwater and Hailey Fuchs of The New York Times; and by Susan Decker of Bloomberg News.
