'We're Not Budging': Pelosi Digs In on Covid Relief

By Yuval Rosenberg

'We're Not Budging': Pelosi and Meadows Make No Progress on
Covid Relief

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and White House Chief of Staff Mark
Meadows resumed talks on a coronavirus relief package on Thursday,
but their 25-minute afternoon phone call failed to produce any
progress in breaking a weeks-long impasse.

Pelosi said afterward that she told Meadows Democrats would be
willing to meet halfway, splitting the difference between their
$3.4 trillion proposal and the White House’s offer of about $1
trillion.

"We have said again and again that we’re willing to meet them in
the middle — $2.2 trillion. When they’re willing to do that, we’ll
be willing to discuss the particulars," Pelosi
told reporters. In a statement released after the
call, Pelosi said the funding Democrats are insisting on would help
combat the coronavirus and boost the economy.

"This conversation made clear that the White House continues to
disregard the needs of the American people as the coronavirus
crisis devastates lives and livelihoods," she said. "The
Administration’s continued failure to acknowledge the funding
levels that experts, scientists and the American people know is
needed leaves our nation at a tragic impasse."

Earlier in the day, Pelosi told reporters that Democrats aren’t
willing to go any lower. "We’re not budging," she said.

McConnell says the country needs another coronavirus
bill: "We need another one, the country needs another one,"
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) reportedly said of a
coronvirus package during a visit to a hospital in Pikeville,
Kentucky.

The Associated Press’s Lisa Mascaro reports
that "McConnell faces his own difficulties because many, if not
most, GOP senators appear satisfied, for now, that there remains
enough existing aid available and new money is not needed. The
split in his ranks gives Pelosi an upper hand in talks because she
has been able to bring most of her Democrats on board with her
proposals."

The bottom line: Congress remains on
recess until September and Meadows said this week he’s "not
optimistic" about reaching a deal before the end of next month,
when a relief package could be combined with talks on must-pass
funding to prevent a government shutdown. Thursday’s talks did
nothing to change that.

Quote of the Day

"To watch these people who never have to worry about a dollar
in their lives go on vacation for a month without even thinking
about the fact that people are going to be homeless and dead at the
end of it, because they want to take their vacation, it’s
crushing."

– Madeleine Olson, a 27-year-old Michigan resident
who lost her job in March, quoted in a
Washington Post story about the anger and
bewilderment felt by many jobless workers after Congress and the
White House let enhanced unemployment payments of $600 a week
expire at the end of last month.

The Post spoke to 20 such people. "Every person
interviewed said they were furious at Washington policymakers for
letting such a critical benefit lapse amid the nation’s worst
economic crisis in a century. Often, the anger was directed at
Republicans, who control the White House and the Senate, although a
few credited President Trump for at least trying to take action on
his own," the Post’s Eli Rosenberg and Heather Long
report.

Trump’s Payroll Tax Plan Is Hung Up in a Dispute With the IRS:
Report

President Trump’s effort to suspend employee Social Security
taxes starting September 1 is hung up over a dispute over who
should be responsible for making the tax payments once the
suspension is over at the end of the year.

According to
Bloomberg News, the White House wants employers to
be on the hook for paying the suspended payroll taxes, not
employees. The IRS, however, says that both employers and employees
would be responsible and subject to collections efforts.

The dispute between the White House and the Treasury Department
over the issue has delayed the publication of guidelines that
businesses say they need to decide whether to participate in the
program. Many companies have expressed concerns about delaying tax
bills until next year, and last week the U.S. Chamber of Commerce
said the plan is "unworkable."

Eliminate the suspended taxes? Top White House economic
adviser Larry Kudlow said last week that the Trump administration
is considering forgiving the payroll tax of 6.2% that employees pay
to help fund Social Security. The taxes "essentially can be
forgiven if you stretch it out five years, eight years," Kudlow
said.

Trump has also said that he would urge Congress to forgive the
taxes if he wins a second term, though few believe that lawmakers
would embrace the idea.

Few companies expected to participate. The tax suspension
was already a bit rushed, and the delay in providing guidance means
that few companies are expected to start suspending payroll taxes
when the program begins next month. "It’s unlikely that many
employers will be able to make the programming changes by September
1," Pete Isberg of the payroll processing firm ADP told
Fox Business. "We’ve advised Congress and Treasury
that anything like this normally requires at least six months for
an orderly programming transition."

Companies wary of the proposed program may be relieved
that the delay is making the whole thing easier to avoid. "The fact
that there hasn’t been guidance is, in some ways, a positive for a
lot of clients who really were not looking forward to having to
deal with it," tax attorney Adam B. Cohen of Eversheds Sutherland
LLP told Bloomberg.

Unemployment Claims Drop, but Still Above 1 Million

New jobless claims dropped last week, the Labor Department said
Thursday, with just over 1 million people filing for state
unemployment benefits on a seasonally adjusted basis. Another
607,000 filed for claims for Pandemic Unemployment Assistance, a
program that provides aid for gig workers and the
self-employed.

The report marked the 23rd week in a row that new jobless claims
exceeded the previous pre-pandemic weekly high, set in 1982.
Overall, about
27 million people are receiving some kind of
unemployment aid.

Many economists noted that, even though they are gradually
improving, the job loss numbers continue to be extraordinarily high
by historical standards, which suggests that the job market could
be experiencing significant long-term damage.

"Even as businesses have reopened and jobs have returned,
layoffs are ongoing reflecting interruptions to activity from virus
containment that are likely resulting in permanent closures and job
losses," Rubeela Farooqi, chief U.S. economist at High Frequency
Economics, said in a report. "The risk of permanent damage to the
labor market remains high which will slow the pace of
recovery."

Fiscal Flashes

12 Million Have Lost Employer-Sponsored Health Insurance:
More than 6 million people have lost their employer-sponsored
health insurance due to job losses since the coronavirus epidemic
struck, according to new research from the Economic Policy
Institute. The researchers estimate that for every person who loses
their insurance, another person, typically a spouse or child, loses
their coverage as well, bringing the total to roughly 12 million.
It’s not clear how many of those have received coverage from
alternative sources such as family members, Medicaid or Obamacare,
but the researchers said it is unlikely that all have found new
sources of insurance. (CBS
News)

Trump to Announce $750 Million Deal for Rapid Covid
Tests: In his acceptance speech at the Republican National
Convention Thursday evening, President Trump is reportedly set to
announce a $750 million deal to have the government by 150 million
rapid Covid-19 tests from Abbot Laboratories. The Food and Drug
Administration granted emergency-use authorization Wednesday for
the company’s $5 Covid-19 antigen test, called BinaxNOW, which
provides results in about 15 minutes. The tests could be used in
doctor’s offices, nursing homes and schools, among other areas.
"This is a major development that will help our country to remain
open, get Americans back to work and kids back to school," White
House senior adviser Alyssa Farah said in a statement. (Politico,

CNBC)

Trump’s ‘All-Out Attack’ on the FDA: President Trump has
launched a crusade against the Food and Drug Administration, one
that officials inside the agency and experts outside it worry may
permanently damage its credibility. Trump on Saturday accused the
FDA of being part of a "deep state" conspiracy to harm his
reelection campaign, and others in the White House have publicly
criticized the agency. Senior FDA officials also worry about the
appointment of Emily Miller, a gun-rights activist and former
correspondent for the far-right One America News Network, as the
agency’s top spokesperson, "empowering her to aggressively reshape
the FDA’s typically nonpolitical, straight-laced public messaging."
And they fear that political considerations could influence or
unduly rush the approval process for a Covid-19 vaccine. (STAT)

Trump’s Businesses Have Been Paid $900,000 by the
Government: President Trump has visited his own properties 270
times since taking office and taxpayers have paid Trump’s
businesses more than $900,000 over that time, with at least
$570,000 of that resulting from Trump’s travel, The Washington
Post’s David A. Fahrenthold, Josh Dawsey and Joshua Partlow report.
The Trump Organization also received at least $3.8 million in fees
from GOP groups as a result of political events featuring Trump at
his properties, according to campaign finance records cited by the
Post.

White House spokesman Judd Deere said in a statement that
Trump has "turned over the day-to-day responsibilities of running
the company though he was not required to, [and] has sacrificed
billions of dollars" during his time in office. He also accused the
Post of "blatantly interfering with the business relationships of
the Trump Organization" and said "it must stop." He added that the
White House is "building up a very large ‘dossier’" on stories by
Fahrenthold and others "as they are a disgrace to journalism and
the American people." (The
Washington Post)

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