McConnell Open to More Stimulus Checks, for Some

By Yuval Rosenberg

McConnell Opens Door to More Stimulus Checks, for Some

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) on Monday outlined
the key elements he’d want to have included in the next coronavirus
relief bill, opening the door to more direct payments to Americans
making up to $40,000 a year and again insisting on legal
protections for businesses.

McConnell
said he would likely release a new bill in a few
weeks. That would be the GOP’s starting point for negotiations with
Democrats. Those talks, likely to start after Congress returns from
a two-week recess on July 20, are expected to be contentious. "I
can’t comfortably predict we’re going to come together and pass it
unanimously like we did a few months ago — the atmosphere is
becoming a bit more political than it was in March," McConnell
said, according to
The Washington Post. "But I think we will do
something again. I think the country needs one last boost."

McConnell added that the coronavirus pandemic is clearly not
over.

Another round of stimulus checks: McConnell said that the
next coronavirus package "could well" include more stimulus checks,
but suggested that the payments would be more narrowly targeted. "I
think the people who’ve been hit the hardest are people who make
about $40,000 a year or less," including many hospitality industry
workers, McConnell said.

Liability protections: McConnell guaranteed that the next
bill would include liability protections to shield business,
hospitals and schools against lawsuits stemming from the
coronavirus. He said the protections would be "narrowly crafted"
and that he envisions they will cover five years, from December
2019 through 2024. Democrats have opposed such a measure.

The bottom line: Once lawmakers
return, they’ll have just a few weeks to hammer out a deal before
their next recess. Right now they aren’t close.

"Instead of talking about writing a partisan bill in his
office to help big corporations, Sen. McConnell ought to be working
across the aisle to prevent mass evictions, a new hunger crisis,
and the layoff of more essential state and local government
employees," Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) said
Monday.

Congressional Republicans and Trump administration
officials also face internal divisions on additional relief
spending that could make it difficult to reach consensus. "I think
the key right now is to try and get sort of the White House and
Republicans on the Hill in the same place," said Sen. John Thune
(R-SD), according to the Post.

Who Got Loans Through PPP Small Business Rescue

Program?

The Trump administration on Monday released data on loans made
through the Paycheck Protection Program meant to help small
businesses get through the coronavirus pandemic, including the
names of 660,000 companies that received loans of $150,000 or more.
The loan recipients include restaurant chains, businesses linked to
members of Congress and the Trump administration, high-priced law
firms, special interest groups, Planned Parenthood locations and
Kanye West’s clothing and sneaker company,
Yeezy.

The disclosure could bring some renewed criticism of the PPP,
which has faced questions about whether it is reaching the
businesses that need help the most. The program generated some
outrage early on when large, publicly traded companies said they
had taken out loans. More than $30 billion in loans were reportedly
returned after the administration said that companies with access
to other sources of capital shouldn’t be borrowing through the
program.

"My 1,000-foot takeaway is that the government was handing
out free money and the line went around the corner," Aaron Klein, a
fellow in economic studies at the Brookings Institution,
told
The New York Times. "This is not your
mom-and-pop shop on Main Street."

The big picture: The program issued
more than $521 billion across nearly 4.9 million
forgivable loans through June 30. The health-care and social
assistance industry received more than $67 billion, or 12.9% of the
loan money. Professional and technical services got 12.7%, while
12.4% went to construction and 10.3% went to manufacturing

The program still has $131.9 billion in funding left unused,
though Congress just passed legislation to extend the application
deadline through August 8 and is considering ways to repurpose
funds left over.

The data released Monday doesn’t include names or addresses for
businesses receiving loans of less than $150,000, which
collectively represent 86.5% of loans and about a quarter of the
total loan dollars approved. The data also only provides loan
amounts in broad ranges, which groups advocating for government
transparency criticized as inadequate.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said that the PPP has
supported more than 51 million jobs and more than 80% of all small
business employees, with an average loan size of about $107,000.
Still, nearly 49,000 loan recipients reported that they would save
zero jobs with the borrowed money and nearly 41,000 others did not
say how many jobs they would keep with the money, according to

The Washington Post. Ten companies apparently
received between $5 million and $10 million but reported retaining
only one job with the money, the Post says.

Who got large loans: More than 4,800 businesses received
loans between $5 million and $10 million. "Restaurants, medical
offices and car dealerships were the top recipients of large loans
from the program," the Times reports. "More than 40,000 full- or
limited-service restaurants received loans worth as much as $32
billion, according to the ranges provided by the government." Among
the large chains with Wall Street backing that received loans
between $5 million and $10 million were PF Changs, Legal Sea Foods
and Silver Diner, according to the Post.

The Times also notes that doctors’ offices received as much as
$19 billion, while law offices got $13 billion, with more than 100
law firms getting loans ranging from $1 million to $10 million. The
firm of President Trump’s longtime personal lawyer, Marc Kasowitz,
received between $5 million and $10 million. The firm said the
money enabled it to keep on its hundreds of employees at full
salary and benefits.

Businesses linked to lawmakers got millions: "At least
nine lawmakers and three congressional caucuses have ties to
organizations that took millions of dollars in aid," Politico

reports. "In total, companies linked to lawmakers
and congressional caucuses have received at least $11 million in
aid from the federal program that Congress created to help small
businesses."

It is not illegal for lawmakers to receive the loans, and their
offices generally emphasized that the money was taken to help keep
workers employed.

Among the lawmakers who own or have other ties to businesses
that received loans are Republicans Reps. Rick Allen (GA), Vicky
Harzler (MO), Kevin Hern (OK), Mike Kelly (PA), Markwayne Mullin
(OK) and Roger Williams (TX) as well as Democratic Reps. Matt
Cartwright (PA), Susie Lee (NV) and Debbie Mucarsel-Powell (FL). A
company tied to the husband of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA)
got a loan of between $350,000 and $1 million.

The Congressional Black Caucus Foundation and the Congressional
Hispanic Caucus Institute, the nonprofit arms of the member
caucuses, also received loans of between $350,000 and $1 million
each.

Trump-connected loans: The Trump Organization did not
apply for PPP loans, but many tenants at buildings owned or managed
by Trump reportedly received funds. An Associated
Press analysis found that as much as $273 million in PPP
aid went to more than 100 companies that are owned or operated by
major Trump donors, though the report notes that there’s no
evidence the companies received favorable treatment as a result of
their Trump connections. Other loan recipients were
linked to Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law and
senior adviser. Businesses tied to Trump’s family and associates
stand to get as much as $21 million in loans, according to
ProPublica.

The disclosure could again raise questions about the extent to
which the president’s businesses are benefitting from his
government role, but plenty of politically connected applicants got
PPP funds.

"A firm that raises money for Mr. Trump’s re-election campaign
and the Republican National Committee received a loan of more than
$1 million, according to the data set, while a company that
produces Mr. Trump’s political advertisements received between
$350,000 and $1 million," the Times reports. "So did a consulting
firm started by President Barack Obama’s former campaign manager
Jim Messina and one that Hillary Clinton’s 2008 campaign paid for
communications consulting."

Cultural institutions: Some well-known cultural
institutions — including some with large endowments — received
millions in PPP loans, Bloomberg News
reports: "The institutions -- such as Carnegie
Hall and the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York and the San
Francisco Symphony -- were among the largest recipients of aid to
nonprofits under the program, with each of them receiving
injections in the range of $5 million to $10 million."

Grover Norquist’s anti-spending group took money: A
foundation affiliated with Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax
Reform, a conservative group known for its anti-tax advocacy and
its efforts to rein in government spending, received a PPP loan of
between $150,000 and $350,000. In a statement, the organizations
said Americans for Tax Reform had never opposed PPP and that the
foundation that received the loan "was badly hurt by the government
shutdown," used the money to avoid layoffs and "does not engage in
lobbying."

But the Daily Beast
notes that Norquist had signed on to a recent
letter asking Trump and McConnell to stop spending on coronavirus
relief. "The inside-the-beltway crowd falsely calls these trillions
of dollars a ‘stimulus’ to the economy," the letter read. "But
government can only give money to some people, as Nobel-prize
winning economist Milton Friedman taught all of us many years ago,
by taking money from others."

Two other groups focused on cutting government spending,
Taxpayers for Common Sense and Citizens Against Government Waste,
also received PPP loans, as did Citizens United, the
group that fought to enable more corporate spending on elections.
On the Left, Media Matters for America reportedly
received a loan of between $1 million and $2 million while the
Center for Economic and Policy Research and The Institute on
Taxation and Economic Policy each received between $350,000 and $1
million, according to
Roll Call.

Op-Ed of the Day: The Cost of a Covid Vaccine

Dr. Elisabeth Rosenthal, the editor in chief of Kaiser Health
News and a contributing opinion writer at The New York Times,
writes that the search for a Covid-19 vaccine could yield a costly
result, at least under the American health care system:

"Now we are looking for viral deliverance when drug
development is one of the world’s most lucrative businesses,
ownership of drug patents is disputed in endless court battles, and
monopoly power often lets manufacturers set any price, no matter
how extraordinary. A new cancer treatment can cost a half-million
dollars and old staples like insulin have risen manifold in price
to thousands of dollars annually.
"And the American government has no effective way to fight
back. … If a Covid-19 vaccine yields a price of, say, $500 a
course, vaccinating the entire population would bring a company
over $150 billion, almost all of it profit. …
"Every other developed country has evolved schemes to set or
negotiate prices, while balancing cost, efficacy and social good.
The United States instead has let business calculations drive drug
price tags, forcing us to accept and absorb ever higher costs. That
feels particularly galling for treatments and vaccines against
Covid-19, whose development and production is being subsidized and
incentivized with billions in federal investment."

Read the full piece, including options for reining in
vaccine costs,
at the Times.

Poll of the Day: 82% Support Extending CARES
Act Benefits

A monthly survey of likely voters for the Financial Times and
the Peter G. Peterson Foundation found that 82% said they support
extending CARES Act benefits. (The Fiscal Times is an editorially
independent organization funded by the late Peter G. Peterson and
his family.)

About two-thirds of those polled said they favor extending the
enhanced unemployment benefits provided by the law, which are
scheduled to expire this month. More than eight in 10 said they
would back an extension of the moratorium on evictions in federally
backed housing and more than three-quarters would favor a payroll
tax cut.

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