[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 218 (Monday, December 21, 2020)]
[Senate]
[Pages S7890-S7893]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
CORONAVIRUS
Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, first, I heard the remarks of the Senator
from Illinois. It is a hope that we can change the way the Senate
operates and do more amendments and do more debating on the floor. We
haven't seen much give from some of our colleagues on the other side of
the aisle, but hopefully that could and will happen.
Now, about remarks here, every day, it seems, for the past week or
so, I have come to the floor ready to talk about the merits of
bipartisan legislation we have been drafting, not wanting to be
critical at all. Then I listen to the Republican leader. The leader's
remarks just about every day this week as he has opened the Senate have
been so nastily partisan and in so many ways false that I have no
choice but to correct the record as the Democratic leader.
The Republican leader's accusation that the blame for this bill's
delay lies totally on one side is just ridiculous. It is ``Alice in
Wonderland'' thinking. It defies all the facts as to what we have seen.
Then his comparison--that the agreement we are voting on today and the
most recent Republican offer are so similar--is absurd. The two bills
are nothing alike, and I had to point that out several times.
I have a chart here.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have this chart printed in
the Record
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:
BIPARTISAN EMERGENCY COVID RELIEF LEGISLATION SIGNIFICANTLY IMPROVES ON
McCONNELL'S INADEQUATE PROPOSAL
------------------------------------------------------------------------
New Bipartisan December 1 GOP
Item Relief Agreement Proposal
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Unemployment Insurance...... $300 per week $0 enhanced UI and
enhanced UI and program extensions
other program end on January 31,
extensions through 2021
March 14, 2021
Direct Payments............. Additional round of $0
payments--$600
individual, $1,200/
married couple, and
$600/child dependent
Corporate Immunity.......... Excluded McConnell/Cornyn
Corporate Immunity
``Red Line''
SNAP........................ $13 billion $0
Rental Assistance........... $25 billion $0
Transportation.............. $45 billion $0
Support for Small Businesses $284.5 billion $257.7 billion
(PPP)......................
Support for Community $12 billion $0
Development Financial
Institutions and Minority
Depository Institutions....
SBA Grants.................. $20 billion $0
Debt Relief Payments and $5.5 billion $0
Enhancements for SBA
Lending Programs...........
SAMHSA Funding for Mental $4.25 billion $0
Health and Substance Use
Disorder...................
NIH COVID Research.......... $1.25 billion $0
Broadband................... $7 billion $0
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mr. SCHUMER. I am just going to read from it, comparing the new,
bipartisan relief agreement to the December 1 GOP proposal of Leader
McConnell.
How about direct payments? This bill has $600 per individual, $1,200
per married couple, $600 child dependent. Many of us didn't think that
was enough, but it is in the bill. Do you know how much was in the
Republican leader's proposal? Zero.
Unemployment insurance. This bill that we are voting on has $300 per
week of enhanced UI and other program extensions through March 14. What
does the Republican leader's bill have? Zero enhanced UI. Program
extensions end January 31.
This bill has $13 billion in SNAP; the Republican leader's bill,
zero.
This bill has $25 billion in rental assistance; the Republican
leader's bill, zero.
This bill has $45 billion in transportation for airlines and mass
transit and buses and airports and highways. What does the Republican
leader's bill have? Zero.
This bill has, very importantly, money for community development
financial institutions and minority institutions, $12 billion. What
does the Republican leader's bill have? Zero.
SBA grants, $20 billion this year; Republican leader's bill, zero.
Debt payments and enhancements for SBA. This bill, $5.5 billion;
Republican bill, zero.
SAMHSA funding for mental health and substance use disorder. This
bill, $4.25 billion; Republican leader's bill, zero.
NIH COVID research, $1.25 billion; Republican bill, zero.
Broadband so homes can get broadband. This bill, $7 billion;
Republican leader's bill, zero.
The list could go on. There is a complete difference between the two
bills.
We all know as well that the Republican leader, who blames Democrats
for delay, said for several months that the Senate should be on pause.
As Democrats were demanding more action, the Republican leader was
unmoved. The Republican leader's answer was that 20 Republican Senators
wanted to do nothing more at all. When he finally proposed legislation,
it was completely partisan, insufficient, and littered with poison
pills.
I forgot to add one thing that was in the leader's bill but not in
this bill--the broad corporate liability immunity provision, which the
Senator from Illinois tried to straighten out. Another huge
difference--a poison pill.
So when the leader finally proposed legislation because of public
pressure to do something, it was partisan--no Democratic input, zero--
insufficient, much too little in so many areas, as I mentioned, and
littered with poison pills designed to ensure the bill would fail. Most
notably was a provision to give corporations, no matter how egregious
their behavior, sweeping immunity from legal accountability. Leader
McConnell said on the floor that for Republicans, corporate immunity
was a red line.
And he blames the Democrats, as he did again today, for why this bill
is being debated now? It is just turning truth on its head. It is like
``Alice in Wonderland.''
Even in the recent negotiations, the Republican majority made an
eleventh hour demand that had nothing to do with helping people during
this pandemic but, rather, sabotaged the incoming Biden
administration's recovery effort and restricted the Federal Reserve's
ability to save jobs and right the economy in a time of crisis.
Thankfully, the agreement we reached contains neither the leader's
corporate immunity provision nor Senator Toomey's last-minute provision
to handicap the Fed's authority to stabilize the economy in a crisis.
And it will do a whole lot of good, besides, some of the programs I
mentioned.
Look, after months of tense and difficult negotiations, we have this
agreement. It is not as large as Democrats want. It is certainly larger
than what many Republicans want. That is the nature of compromise. It
does us no good to end the year with the kind of bitter, partisan
fighting that has defined too much of the year. In a new session and
under a new administration, we can and should do better because our job
is far from over.
The bill today is a good bill. Today is a good day, but it is
certainly not the end of the story. It cannot be the end of the story.
Anyone who thinks this bill is enough doesn't know what is going on in
America. Anyone who thinks this bill is enough hasn't heard the
desperation in the voices of their constituents, has not looked into
the eyes of a small business owner on the brink of ruin.
By all rights, there should be direct assistance in this bill for
State and local governments. The checks should
[[Page S7891]]
be larger. While this agreement includes a new and larger forgivable
PPP loan for restaurants, we need to do much more for restaurants. We
have bipartisan legislation to deliver the relief that is truly needed,
the RESTAURANTS Act, which, regrettably, did not make it into this
legislation. We must do all we can to save restaurants, and I will not
stop fighting until we pass the RESTAURANTS Act into law. This bill
cannot and will not be the final word on congressional relief from the
coronavirus pandemic. This is an emergency survival package.
When we come back in January, our No. 1 job will be to fill in the
gaps left by the bill and then get the economy moving with strong
Federal input. Still, the significance of this package should not be
underestimated. It will be the second largest bill--the second largest
Federal input--in the history of our country. It will be the second
largest amount of Federal dollars going to the people ever. The times
demand it. Even some of our conservative Republican friends will vote
for it, and it is good we have it. For much of the year, it looked
unlikely that it would ever get done, and our success today, our
ability to pass this bill today, should give us confidence we can do
more. We can end the year on a rare note of optimism.
Now, Queen Elizabeth, every year, gives a talk to her subjects about
the status of the monarchy and the British royal family. In a very
challenging year, she called the year annus horribilis--a horrible
year. Unlike in 1992, which was the year Elizabeth referred to the
problems with Charles and Diana, this year has been an annus horribilis
not just for Great Britain and the royal family, which she was talking
about, but an annus horribilis for the entire world.
The global COVID-19 pandemic has infected more than 70 million people
across the globe. Another 500 million have gone, likely, undiagnosed.
There are 1.6 million people who have died, 20 percent of whom have
been Americans, more than 315,000--more than the entire population of
Pittsburgh or St. Louis, more than all of the American combat deaths in
World War II. The September 11 attacks to my fair city shaped much of
the first decade of this century. In 2020, our dear country has
suffered the equivalent of a 9/11 attack every day for 106 days in a
row.
We have lost so much. We have missed holidays and reunions,
retirements and graduations, bar mitzvahs and confirmations, weddings
and funerals. Trapped in our homes, our companions were isolation and
loneliness and the faint glow of tiny screens. The image of seeing
people on the screen, watching their loved ones pass away when they
couldn't be with them, will stay with us forever. Doctors had to stack
iPads in waiting rooms for end-of-life conversations--how tragic, how
awful. There were cars lined up, bumper to bumper, for food assistance.
Grandchildren, wrapped in protective gear, waved goodbye to
grandparents from across the silence of a hospital room.
It has been a horrible year--annus horribilis. Yet here, at the very
end, finally, there is hope--not just one, not just two, but three
strong beacons of hope. One, soon many Americans will have the vaccine.
Two, Joe Biden will become President. He has the experience and the
empathy to handle the COVID crisis and will replace a man who has shown
no capacity or even interest in doing so. And, three, we are on the
verge of passing another historic, bipartisan relief bill to deliver
emergency assistance during a time of national emergency. So there are
three beacons of hope: the vaccine, a new administration, and a bill
that will help in an emergency.
Very soon, our country will close the book on the most chaotic
President in recent history. Joe Biden, an experienced leader and a
person of fundamental human decency, will become the 46th President of
the United States. Kamala Harris, my good friend and hard-working
colleague, will become the first woman, the first Black person, and the
first Asian American to ascend to the Vice Presidency of the United
States. Together, they will return competency and compassion to our
government after 4 long years of division and demonization, which far
too many people have tolerated and gone along with.
Even though this disease has not been vanquished yet, there is light
at the end of the tunnel in the form of a vaccine. Everyone should
appreciate how miraculous that truly is. It usually takes between 5 and
10 years to develop a new vaccine--5 to 10 years. It took American
doctors, biochemists, and medical researchers less than 10 months to
produce not one but two viable vaccines for the coronavirus. The
discovery of a vaccine in a single calendar year is the crowning
scientific achievement of the 21st century--the medical Manhattan
Project of our times. It is a reminder that, when we work together and
persevere and sacrifice for one another, nothing--nothing--is beyond
our capacity as a nation.
The same resilience and innovation and fortitude that saw our country
through its darkest hours has emerged once again. COVID-19 has changed
our country, but it has not changed our character. America is the
night-shift nurse fashioning protective equipment from shoelaces and
sheets of vinyl. America is a restaurant owner who sent meals to
frontline workers for free. America is the home-stitched mask sent to
friends and families. It is the metallic clang of pots and pans that
celebrates essential workers. America is the grocery store clerk and
the busdriver and the plasma donor and the lab technician, late at
night, poring over the results of a clinical trial. It is the Brooklyn
doctor, 62, on the verge of retirement, who, for 2 straight weeks,
worked day shifts at the ICU and night shifts at the nearby hospital
before finally succumbing to the disease himself.
Last week, the first American--a nurse in Queens--was vaccinated
against COVID-19. Many millions will soon follow. Eventually, our
businesses will reopen, our economy will reopen, and life will reopen.
We will travel and worship and send our kids to school and see our
friends and be together again. It won't be tomorrow or next week or
even next month, but it will happen, not because we merely waited long
enough, not because we were patient, but because we persevered.
Our job right now is to help the country get from this stormy present
to that hopeful future, to survive this dark winter until spring thaws
the ice. Our job is to do what is necessary--pass this bill, pass
another stronger bill next year--whatever it takes to hold our country
together until we eradicate the awful scourge of this disease.
At the end of this annus horribilis--this horrible year--let us give
the American people another reason to hope
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority whip.
Mr. THUNE. Mr. President, I am, like many of my colleagues, very
pleased that we have reached an agreement on a final COVID relief
package and none too soon.
Last week, we celebrated what will, hopefully, be a turning point in
the COVID fight--the first coronavirus vaccinations. We need to build
on that momentum and make sure that vaccine distribution goes swiftly
and smoothly so that we can vaccinate as many Americans as possible as
quickly as possible. The COVID relief package will help us achieve that
goal by providing important funding for vaccine distribution. It will
also provide critical support to Americans to help them weather the
rest of the pandemic, including a second round of paycheck protection
funding for the hardest hit small businesses, money to help schools
reopen safely and operate so that our kids aren't left behind, and more
money for coronavirus treatment and other frontline medical priorities.
I am very pleased that the final package includes my Paycheck
Protection for Producers Act, which will help more farmers and ranchers
benefit from the Paycheck Protection Program. The bill also includes
funding to allow the Department of Agriculture to provide additional
assistance to farmers and ranchers. Ag producers were dealing with a
challenging agricultural economy even before the pandemic hit, and the
coronavirus has only made things tougher. I strongly advocated for
including additional funding for farmers and ranchers in this
legislation, and I am very glad that the final bill includes this
support.
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The final package also explicitly makes biofuels, like ethanol and
biodiesel, eligible for USDA assistance at the discretion of the
Secretary of Agriculture. Biofuel producers have suffered from a drop
in fuel demand during the pandemic, and I hope the Secretary will
ensure that they are able to receive assistance, which will further
help our ag economy recover.
I am very happy that the COVID relief package includes an extension
of the Thune-Warner Employer Participation in Repayment Act. The Thune-
Warner bill allows employers to make tax-free contributions to their
employees' student loans of up to $5,250 per year. This is a win for
employees, who get help in paying off their student loans, and it is a
win for employers as they look to attract and retain talented workers.
Our bill was included in the CARES Act--the major coronavirus relief
legislation we passed in March--but it was scheduled to expire at the
end of the year. Under the coronavirus relief package, however, our
legislation will be extended for an additional 5 years.
The COVID relief package also includes Senator Cornyn's Small
Business Expense Protection Act, which I cosponsored. This legislation
will ensure that small businesses that qualify for forgiveness of their
Paycheck Protection Program loans can still deduct their ordinary
business expenses on their taxes.
The relief package also includes legislation I introduced this summer
with Senator Enzi that will establish antifraud measures within the
Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program so that we can ensure that
beneficiaries are truly eligible for the program.
We have addressed a lot of coronavirus priorities in this relief
package, and I am very pleased that we are finally getting it out the
door. Republicans spent months pushing for additional, targeted
coronavirus relief, and I am glad the Democrats finally decided that
they were ready to work with us in a bipartisan way to arrive at this
legislation.
The Senate Democratic leader was just here, once again, attacking
Republicans over their failure--the Democrats' failure--to work with us
to get a coronavirus relief bill sooner. We brought up multiple times
on the floor legislation that could have passed if there had been a
little cooperation from the Democrats. He pointed out that this bill we
are going to be voting on today looks nothing like the Republican bill,
which isn't the case. There are a lot of similarities between the bill
that we put on the floor in September and again in October--about $600
billion in targeted relief that addresses the most fundamental needs
the American people need right now. One is an unemployment insurance
extension for those who are unemployed. The very amount that is in the
bill that we will vote on today was in the Republican bill that we
brought to the floor in September and again in October and voted on
here.
The vaccine money--the money that is out there to help with the
vaccines that are going to be so effective in trying to get this
pandemic under control--was also in the bill that was on the floor both
in September and in October.
The relief for small businesses that have been hit hard by this
pandemic and have seen their balance sheets and their income statements
get depleted by its economic impact also would have been funded with
additional Paycheck Protection Program relief in the bill that we
brought before the Senate both in September and again in October. That
very assistance is included in the legislation that we will vote on
today.
Money for schools, as I mentioned earlier, to help them reopen
safely--something that was in the legislation that we voted on in
September, again in October--is in the legislation that we will vote on
today.
The only things that are different, really--substantially different--
from what we brought up on the floor back then are the assistance
checks that are included in this legislation. That is something that
was a priority. It was a priority for Members on the Republican side;
it was a priority for Members on the Democratic side; it was a priority
for the White House, so it ended up being included in this and,
hopefully, will provide some much needed relief to people across this
country who have been struggling with their personal finances and their
family finances through the pandemic.
So those are all things that we have discussed and debated
previously, and I would point out that, contrary to the assertions made
by the Democratic leader just now, there were numerous attempts to try
and move this legislation previously.
Now, it is fair to say that the House of Representatives did send the
Senate a $3.4 trillion package, which was bloated and included lots of
nonpandemic, noncoronavirus relief-related items--things that were on
their liberal wish list. That wasn't realistic, and they knew it. That
was a campaign document designed to try and help them, at the time, win
an election.
But I am glad they have decided to get down and negotiate in a
serious way because the number that we are going to be passing today--a
little under $1 trillion, about $900 billion--is very close to what
Republicans put on the floor in September and again in October.
It is a far cry from the $3.4 trillion bloated bill that the
Democrats sent over from the House and the Democrats here in the Senate
tried to advance and suggested that that should be what the Senate
should vote on.
We have said all along that we need to address this in a targeted
way, a fiscally responsible way, a way that recognizes the most
critical needs out there, both on the healthcare front and also on the
economic front, and we have moved aggressively to address those needs
not once, but twice.
Legislation, a real bill brought to the floor, which received a
majority vote in the U.S. Senate--52 U.S. Senators in September and
again in October voted here on the floor of the U.S. Senate to do the
very things that I just mentioned--but it was blocked from even being
considered by the Senate Democrats.
We all know here in the Senate it requires 60 votes to invoke
cloture. It is a procedural motion to get on a bill. The Senate
Democrats gave us no support to even get on the bill.
So, as a consequence, even though there was majority support--52 U.S.
Senators voting in favor of getting on and debating the bill--because
the Democrats blocked it, we didn't even have an opportunity to
debate--not even to get on it, let alone offer amendments and have a
discussion and a conversation and work on legislation. If they had
objections to it or things they wanted to improve or things they wanted
to make better, they would have had an opportunity to do that if we had
simply been able to get on the bill.
So we are where we are today at this late hour in the year--December
21, Christmas week--doing this now because they didn't want to do it
earlier, and some have publicly acknowledged that one of the reasons
they didn't want to do it earlier is that there was a campaign
underway, and they had hoped that there would be a new President, an
opportunity to do it their way later.
But, nevertheless, we have before us now, finally, at long last, a
piece of legislation that addresses the most critical needs that are
out there, and it is very similar in many ways, in terms of the
substance, the content, and the features of the bill and the overall
pricetag, to what Republicans have brought on the floor of the U.S.
Senate previously.
So I am glad that we are finally going to get this done, but I
absolutely disagree with the statements that were made earlier by the
Democratic leader, because they don't reflect reality. In fact, they
don't reflect anything close to reality about what has been happening
here in this Chamber over the past several months when it comes to
trying to provide much needed relief to the American people who are
suffering from this pandemic.
There are a couple of things that I would just mention briefly that
aren't included in the bill, and I wish they were.
I have a bill called the Remote and Mobile Worker Relief Act, and I
am sorry that was not included in the final bill.
This bipartisan legislation would have prevented unexpected tax bills
and tax complications for medical professionals who traveled to other
States
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to help during the pandemic and for Americans who worked from home to
help slow the virus's spread.
It is unfortunate that opposition from a handful of States with
aggressive taxation policies--like the Senate Democratic leader's home
State of New York--has so far prevented legislation like mine from
getting through Congress. But I will continue to fight for tax relief
for remote and mobile workers
It has been a difficult year for our country. There are way too many
virus infections, way too many hospitalizations, way too many people
who have lost loved ones from this dreaded virus. It has affected
people in so many ways--their health, their confidence, their economic
standing and status, their mental health. There are just so many--so
many--effects of this, and this winter is likely to be very
challenging.
But the encouraging news is that there is light at the end of the
tunnel. There is a vaccine out there that will get more widely out
there, and thanks to the resources that we put into the first
coronavirus bill--the CARES Act that passed last March--those vaccines
have been moving forward at record speed--five times faster than any
vaccine in history.
Light is at the end of the tunnel. The vaccines are coming. They are
going to be proven to be very effective, and there is additional
funding in this particular legislation that we will vote on today to
make sure that it gets distributed as quickly as possible.
We are going to make it through this, and I look forward to sending
the additional relief that is included in this legislation that we will
move through the Senate today and put on the President's desk, where he
can sign it into law. I look forward to seeing that additional relief
get out to the American people.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Barrasso). The Senator from North
Carolina.
____________________