Dems Say Trump Sitting on Billions in Coronavirus Testing Money

By Yuval Rosenberg

Dems Say Trump Sitting on Billions in Covid
Testing Money

The Trump administration is sitting on nearly $14 billion in
funding provided by Congress to help states with coronavirus
testing and contract tracing, two top Democrats said Sunday,
calling on the administration to distribute the money
“immediately.”

Congress in April approved $25 billion to ramp up testing and
tracing and another $2 billion to cover free testing for the
uninsured. “While it has been months since these funds were first
appropriated, the Administration has failed to disburse significant
amounts of this funding, leaving communities without the resources
they need to address the significant challenges presented by the
virus,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York and Sen.
Patty Murray of Washington said in a
letter to Health and Human Services Secretary Alex
Azar.

The senators wrote that the administration has full discretion
regarding more than $8 billion of the $25 billion in funding but
has not released a plan to distribute the money. “It is critical
that the Administration disburse the $8 billion immediately with an
emphasis on addressing two major unmet needs: contact tracing and
collecting data on COVID-19 racial and ethnic disparities,” they
wrote.

The senators also said that the Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention has yet to award nearly $4 billion that could be used
for surveillance and contact tracing efforts.

In a response provided to The Washington Post, HHS said it has
distributed $14 billion of the $25 billion but that Congress had
failed to give the agency clear and specific guidance on how to
spend the rest. “Now members [of Congress] are contacting HHS with
their individual priorities and complaining the dollars are not
spent to their wishes,” Michael Caputo, assistant secretary for
public affairs at the agency, told the Post. “Regardless, HHS is
committed to working with Congress to ensure the healthcare
delivery system gets the support needed at this time.”

The Democratic letter comes after President Trump on Saturday
told supporters at his campaign rally in Tulsa that he had asked
officials to slow down coronavirus testing. After saying that the
United States has now tested 25 million people, Trump added: "When
you do testing to that extent, you're going to find more people;
you're going to find more cases. So I said to my people, ‘Slow the
testing down, please.’"

Critics quickly called that another example of Trump putting his
personal political interests above the health and safety of the
nation, but administration officials have
downplayed those remarks, saying they were made in
jest, were “tongue-in-cheek” or were just
“a passing observation.”

In an interview with Scripps News on Monday, the president
refused to directly answer whether he had instructed staff to slow
down testing. “If we did slow it down, we wouldn't show nearly as
many cases,” Trump said.
“Frankly, I think we're way ahead of ourselves, if you want to know
the truth. We've done too good a job … The reason we have more
cases [is] because we do more testing than any other country by
far.”

Public health experts say that the recent surge in cases
seen in many U.S. states is
not just the result of increased
testing.

Coronavirus Stimulus May Have Prevented a Surge in Poverty

Despite an extraordinary rise in unemployment during the
coronavirus crisis, the level of poverty in the U.S. has remained
steady or even fallen slightly thanks to the unprecedented increase
in federal relief spending, according to new studies
reviewed by Jason DeParle of The New York Times.

Researchers at the Center on Poverty and Social Policy at
Columbia University found that the roughly $500 billion Congress
authorized in the CARES Act for additional safety net spending
helped prevent millions of people from falling into poverty. About
half of that funding is dedicated to the $600-per-week increase in
unemployment benefits and other enhancements to jobless benefits
(see the chart below).

With the relief spending, the researchers projected the
poverty rate will rise slightly this year to 12.7%, up from 12.5%
before the pandemic. Without the spending, the rate would have
climbed to 16.3%, with roughly 12 million more people becoming
impoverished.

“Right now, the safety net is doing what it’s supposed
to do for most families — helping them secure a minimally decent
life,” said Zachary Parolin, one of the researchers. “Given the
magnitude of the employment loss, this is really remarkable.’’

A separate study found that the surge in federal spending
actually lowered the poverty rate as poorer households saw an
increase in income. Using a different definition of poverty,
researchers at the University of Chicago and Notre Dame found that
the 12-month poverty rate fell from 10.9% in January and
February to 8.6% in April and May.

What’s next? The researchers emphasize that despite
the better-than-expected estimates on poverty, millions of
Americans continue to face serious hardships. Some workers have
been unable to access payments they are entitled to receive, and
the disbursement of aid has been uneven and sometimes
unpredictable.

More significantly, much of the increased safety net
spending is temporary, with the enhanced unemployment benefits
slated to expire at the end of July. While policymakers are still
debating what comes next, it’s almost certain that the
extraordinary spending authorized by Congress will decline as the
economy reopens, potentially setting the stage for a significant
increase in poverty if the recovery is sluggish and unemployment
remains elevated for an extended period of time.

For more details, see the studies
here and
here, and The New York Times article
here.

Trump Admin Agrees to Disclose More Details on PPP Bailout
Loans

Facing congressional pressure, the Treasury Department and Small
Business Administration said
Friday that they will disclose details of most loans made through
the Paycheck Protection Program, the $660 billion coronavirus
rescue package for small businesses.

The Small Business Administration will provide names and other
details of companies and nonprofits that received loans of $150,000
or more, which the administration says accounts for about 75% of
the loan dollars approved. Loan amounts will be given in ranges
rather than exact amounts. But the new policy will only apply to a
minority of the more than 4.6 million loan recipients, as borrowers
with loans below $150,000 will not be identified, though some
general information, such as zip codes and industry types, will be
released.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin had sparked controversy last
week when he said that details of the loans would be proprietary
and confidential. Mnuchin said the new agreement with the
bipartisan leaders of the Senate Small Business Committee “will
strike the appropriate balance of providing public transparency,
while protecting the payroll and personal income information of
small businesses, sole proprietors, and independent
contractors.”

A critic, Danielle Brian of the nonprofit Project on Government
Oversight, charged that the new policy falls short. “This is
absolutely not enough,” Brian said. “By grouping the loan amounts
[into ranges] we’re still not going to have the kind of information
we need to ensure that money is going to the right people ... those
who really need it.”

The PPP, which has made more than 4.6 million loans worth
$514 billion, is scheduled to stop accepting applications at the
end of June.

Chart of the Day

Epidemiologists talk about “bending the curve” – the process
of bringing infections under control during an epidemic, with the
graph of new cases changing from a positive to a negative slope. As
this chart indicates, the U.S., unlike many of its peers, is not
succeeding in this task. “Many countries have bent the curve, the
US not yet,” Max Roser of Oxford University said
Monday.
The first trailer for "Hamilton," the movie, is
out. Watch it
here. Send your tips and feedback to yrosenberg@thefiscaltimes.com.
Follow us on Twitter:
@yuvalrosenberg,
@mdrainey and
@TheFiscalTimes. And please tell your
friends they can
sign up here for their own copy of this
newsletter.

News

Views and Analysis