Washington Update
Special Edition
March 27
The House on Friday passed a historic $2 trillion coronavirus relief package, overcoming
11th-hour hurdles erected by a GOP lawmaker that sent furious lawmakers across the country
racing back to Washington to move the emergency legislation to President Trump ‘s desk.
The enormous package, approved by the Senate late Wednesday night, provides hundreds of
billions of dollars for the industries, small businesses, unemployed workers and health care
providers hit hardest by the coronavirus pandemic, which has devastated economies around the
world.
Trump has said he’ll sign the bill immediately. House Democratic leaders were able to move the
package by voice vote, a rarely used procedure allowing a few members to air their objections
without forcing the entire chamber to reconvene. But it didn’t happen without a good dose of
last-minute drama on the chamber floor.
To pass the bill, leaders in both parties had to unite to foil an attempted blockade by Rep.
Thomas Massie , a Kentucky Republican who had driven to Washington for the vote and
requested a recorded tally, which requires the participation of at least half of all sitting House
members.
Lawmakers in both parties thwarted Massie’s effort with a procedural gambit of their own: An
insufficient number rose in support of his roll-call request, allowing the speedier voice vote to
stand.
Still, Massie’s threat of a recorded vote sent leaders in both parties scrambling Thursday night to
bring enough lawmakers back to the Capitol to approve the massive relief package. And many
were furious that they were forced to defy the recommendations of the congressional physician
and other public health experts, who have warned against such gatherings.
GOP leaders declined to allow Massie to speak on the floor prior to the vote, prompting him to
accuse his own party brass of being “afraid of the truth.”
“The fix is in,” he tweeted from the floor. “If this bill is so great for America, why not allow a
vote on it?”
The highly unusual proceedings created some light-hearted moments on the floor, despite the
underlying tensions. Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), the last to speak before the vote, took the
extraordinary step of using the podium to call lawmakers from their offices to the chamber,
where some went to the third-floor galleries overlooking the chamber to avoid overcrowding on
the floor.
“The sooner you come, the shorter my remarks will be,” she said to laughter.
The House had a remarkably low turnout within the 432-member chamber, reflecting the rising
apprehensions of lawmakers to board planes and gather in crowds as the cases of the highly
contagious virus have jumped in recent days above 85,000 in the United States alone.
Still, those that did make the trek wasted no time lashing at Massie, with some accusing the
five-term Kentuckian of jeopardizing their well-being for forcing them back to Washington.
“It’s an act of vanity and selfishness that goes beyond comprehension,” Rep. Dan Kildee
(D-Mich.) said Friday.
Trump joined the chorus of critics shortly after the floor debate began, calling for Kentucky
voters to “throw Massie out of the Republican Party!”
Massie, for his part, has defended his attempted blockade, saying the Senate’s legislation defied
the constitutional requirement that federal spending bills originate in the House.
“The senate did some voodoo just like with Obamacare,” he tweeted Thursday. “It’s the House’s
job to reject the process.”
Publicity stunt or not, Massie’s effort didn’t work. The willingness of both sides to accept the
voice vote reflected the heavy pressure facing Congress to move quickly and aggressively to
counter the devastating effects — both health-related and economic — of the deadly outbreak,
which has killed more than 1,300 Americans, tanked markets, shuttered business and sparked
massive layoffs across the country.
The Labor Department reported Thursday that jobless claims hit almost 3.3 million last week
alone — a massive spike over the roughly 200,000 applications filed just a few weeks ago.
Heightening the pressure on the House to move quickly, the Senate passed the massive relief bill
without a single vote of dissent.
Among the major provisions, the $2 trillion package provides cash payments up to $1,200 for
individual Americans; offers $367 billion in low-cost loans to affected small businesses; expands
unemployment insurance by $250 billion, while extending existing benefits by 13 weeks; and
furnishes $500 billion to backstop loans for the hardest-hit industries, including airline and hotel
companies.
“Today we’ve all acknowledged our nation faces an economic and health emergency of historic
proportions due to the coronavirus pandemic — the worst pandemic in over 100 years,” Pelosi
said.
House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) delivered a similarly urgent message.
“We didn’t invite it. We didn’t ask for it. We didn’t choose it,” he said. “But we will fight it
together — until we win, together.”
For leaders of both parties, selling the package was no simple task.
Many liberals have hammered the bill as a corporate giveaway, citing the absence of provisions
to expand paid leave and strengthen worker-safety protections, particularly for the medical
workers on the front lines of diagnosing and treating the coronavirus.
Democrats had also pressed to include more funding for pensions, food stamps and medical care
for those who contract the virus. All of those provisions, Pelosi told her caucus on a Thursday
call, will be a part of the next, fourth round of coronavirus relief in the weeks ahead.
Conservatives, meanwhile, have grumbled about the sheer size of the spending package — none
of it paid for — and provisions they deem extraneous to the immediate crisis, like $25 million for
the Kennedy Center in Washington.
In the end, however, the urgency of the moment was enough to Trump all of the objections,
sending the package to the president’s desk.
When the next phase of relief might arrive is anyone’s guess.
The Senate left Washington after Wednesday’s vote, and is not expected to return before April
20. And the House is also expected to take an extended recess following Friday’s vote.
Pelosi has warned, however, that both chambers should be prepared to return at any time, as
dictated by conditions on the ground.
“Everybody has to be on call for what we need when we need it,” she said Thursday. “We don’t
know what that might be. But whatever it is, we’ll be ready.”