Pelosi Says Help Is On the Way, but When?

By Yuval Rosenberg

Pelosi Says Help Is On the Way, but When?

Help is on the way, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) said in an
interview with MSNBC on Wednesday, referring to the coronavirus
relief package she’s been negotiating with the White House. But she
acknowledged that a deal may not come together in time to be voted
on before the November 3 elections.

"I'm optimistic, because even with what Mitch McConnell says —
‘We don't want to do it before the election’ — but let's keep
working so that we can do it after the election," Pelosi said. "We
want to before. But again, I want people to know, help is on the
way. It will be bigger. It will be better. It will be safer, and it
will be retroactive."

Pelosi and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin spoke for 48
minutes Wednesday afternoon and continued to make progress toward a
deal, Drew Hammill, a spokesperson for the speaker, tweeted.

"Today's conversation brings us closer to being able to put pen
to paper to write legislation. With the exchange of legislative
language, we are better prepared to reach compromise on several
priorities," he
wrote. "Differences continue to be narrowed on health
priorities, including language providing a national strategic
testing and contract tracing plan, but more work needs to be done
to ensure that schools are the safest places in America for
children to learn."

Hammill said the negotiators plan to speak again Thursday, and
White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows told Fox Business that the
administration’s goal is to reach an agreement in the next 48
hours. "The biggest issue remains state and local assistance,"
Meadows
said. "That remains a stumbling block." Meadows
said that the White House has proposed providing $250 billion in
aid to state and local governments while Pelosi is pushing for
about twice that amount.

Not making it any easier: President Trump weighed in on

Twitter late Thursday afternoon. "Just don’t see any way
Nancy Pelosi and Cryin’ Chuck Schumer will be willing to do what is
right for our great American workers, or our wonderful USA itself,
on Stimulus. Their primary focus is BAILING OUT poorly run (and
high crime) Democrat cities and states....," he wrote.

McConnell does his math: Senate Republicans remain
another obstacle. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has
warned the White House against a pre-election deal, which could put
many of his members in the uncomfortable position of either
opposing a roughly $2 trillion package backed by President Trump —
and
favored by voters — or agreeing to the kind of
additional deficit spending they’ve warned against, potentially
alienating some of their conservative base. Either way, they may
risk losing some votes.

"The leader’s position is sort of dictated by the math," said
Senate Republican Whip John Thune of South Dakota, according to

Axios. "I mean, he knows where the votes are and
as much as we all want to get a deal, a deal that would pass in the
Senate with all Democratic votes and a handful of Republicans is
not something the leader would like to happen."

McConnell also remains focused on the quick confirmation of
Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett, which could be affected by
a massive stimulus package suddenly landing on the schedule.

Pelosi reportedly suggested Wednesday that McConnell "might not
mind doing it after the election." White House economic adviser
Larry Kudlow said that at least announcing a deal before the
election would be "very helpful to the economy and markets," even
if any congressional vote had to wait.

Meadows reportedly said that Trump is "willing to lean into
this" to win the support of Senate Republicans, and the president
has expressed confidence that those lawmakers will come along.
That’s not assured. CNN’s Lauren Fox
writes: "After years of sticking with Trump
despite his antics and the fact that some of the President's
policies flew in the face of long-established GOP orthodoxy, the
stimulus bill is the make-or-break moment where Republican senators
may finally throw up their hands and tell Trump ‘no.’"

Narrower Senate GOP plan again blocked by
Dems: McConnell tried to move a narrower, $500
billion relief package Wednesday, but it was
blocked by Democrats. That legislation, similar to
an earlier plan that was also blocked by Democrats, would provide
$300 in weekly federal unemployment benefits through the end of the
year as well as funding for schools, coronavirus testing and
vaccines. It also includes a liability shield for businesses and
schools that Democrats oppose. The package was seen as a messaging
maneuver with no chance of advancing, meant largely to buy
Republicans some political cover on Covid relief
efforts.

Trump’s Drug Discount Cards for Seniors Get Pushed Back

The Trump administration plans to send $200 discount cards for
prescription drugs to more than 30 million Medicare beneficiaries,
but the White House is abandoning an effort to have them shipped
out before Election Day following complaints that the effort could
violate election laws.

"I think that was a concern that there might have been a look
that this was done for a political motivation. That’s not the
case," Meadows said Wednesday.

Administration officials are expected to approve a final plan
for the program, which will cost an estimated $8 billion, within
the next 48 hours, Bloomberg
reported Wednesday. However, the cards aren’t
expected to be sent out until November or December.

OxyContin Maker Pleads Guilty, Will Pay $8.3 Billion

Purdue Pharma has agreed to plead guilty to federal criminal
charges for its role in creating the opioid crisis, the Justice
Department announced Wednesday. The OxyContin maker will pay $8.3
billion in fines and penalties, which will be used to fund
addiction treatment and abatement programs.

The charges include conspiracy to defraud the United States and
violating federal anti-kickback laws, according to the
Associated Press.

The company, which declared bankruptcy last year, lacks the cash
to pay the fines, and as part of the settlement the company will be
dissolved, with its assets rolled into a public company operated to
benefit the American public. All earnings of the firm, which will
continue to produce painkillers, will be used to pay fines and
combat the addiction crisis.

The Sackler family, who earned billions of dollars operating
Purdue, agreed to pay $225 million as part of a separate settlement
with the Justice Department. The settlement does not eliminate the
possibility that some members of the family could still be charged
with additional federal crimes.

A fraction of the total cost: Purdue
has been marketing OxyContin since 1995, when its time-release
formula for oxycodone, an opium derivative, was approved by the
FDA. Lawsuits from multiple state and local governments against the
company suggest that the total cost of the opioid addiction crisis
that it helped spark comes to more than $2 trillion over the last
two decades.

Trump’s Farm Bailout Pumps $21 Billion Into GOP Counties

More than 90% of the funds disbursed by a program that
compensates American farmers hurt by retaliatory tariffs during
President Trump’s trade war with China was sent to counties that
voted Republican in the 2016 presidential election, according to a

report Tuesday evening in The Washington Post.

The Agriculture Department’s Market Facilitation Program, which
distributed more than $23 billion in 2018 and 2019, sent about $21
billion to Trump counties, and just $2.1 billion to counties won by
Hillary Clinton.

"That this disparity falls so heavily along political lines is a
function of the likelihood of rural voters to support Trump,
certainly," the Post’s Philip Bump says. "But that doesn’t detract
from the point that this was nonetheless a massive redistribution
of money to places that supported Trump."

Bump points out that farm subsidies were funded by tariffs
on Chinese imports — a cost that is borne by all Americans and not,
as Trump insists, the Chinese. "It’s as though a Democratic
president decided to tax Americans broadly to send billions of
dollars to the country’s largest cities," Bump writes. "The
recipients would overwhelmingly be members of his or her own
party."

Quote of the Day

"You could literally have 10 monkeys with flamethrowers go
after the money, and they wouldn’t have burned through it as
stupidly."

– Mike Murphy, a veteran Republican consultant and
outspoken Trump critic, in an
Associated Press story on how the Trump political
operation has spent much of the more than $1 billion it has raised
since 2017.

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