Washington, D.C.—Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) today spoke on the
Senate floor and called on Republicans to take the serious steps needed to pass
a serious, bipartisan proposal that meets the real and urgent needs of the
American people who are still confronting the public health and economic crises
brought forth by COVID-19.
Below are Senator
Schumer’s remarks, which can also be viewed here:
Now, over the past week and a half, Speaker Pelosi and I have been
engaged in serious negotiations with the White House over another round of
emergency relief for the American people. Our motivation is simple. Americans
are crying out for relief. Cases, hospitalizations, and deaths continue to
climb. The snowball of economic impacts continues to roll downhill. This
morning, we learned that another 1.2 million Americans filed for
unemployment—far more than at any time during the Great Recession that began in
2008.
Our two parties don’t agree on a whole lot. That is no secret. The
Trump administration has bungled this crisis since the very beginning, and even
now is careening from one self-inflicted crisis to the next. Democrats believe
that Congress has a moral obligation to step into the breach. To help Americans
put food on the table and keep a roof over their heads. To save our economy
from a deeper recession and longer recovery and fight this disease with all the
resources and wherewithal a great nation can bring to bear.
So after the Senate Republican majority failed, in spectacular
fashion, to put together a bill even its own members could support, Democrats
have engaged in arduous negotiations with the White House, trying to impress
upon them the gravity of the situation. We have made progress this week, but
not enough. And the biggest reason is that President Trump and his aides and
his party in Congress are not truly awake to what’s happening in this country.
The Trump administration and Senate Republicans have badly mauled
the body politic, the American economy and American health care, and we
Democrats believe the patient needs a major operation while Republicans want to
apply a band-aid. And we won't let them just pass the band aid, go home, and
still leave America bleeding. That’s the difference right now, on so many
issues.
Our Republican counterparts refuse to acknowledge that Americans
who have lost their job through no fault of their own might need some
assistance with the rent. The Republican leader warns of an “epidemic of
lawsuits” that hasn’t materialized. What will materialize, soon, is an epidemic
of evictions unless we extend the moratorium and pass rental assistance.
Between 19 and 23 million households, one in five rental households, will be at
risk of eviction by the end of September. Unless we do something. Unless our
Republican colleagues wake up.
Our Republican counterparts refuse to acknowledge that state,
local, and tribal governments—who the Trump Administration abandoned in the
early days of this crisis—might need federal support to prevent teachers,
firefighters, bus drivers from being laid off, and public services from being
slashed at the worst possible time. Leader McConnell just states that states
should just go bankrupt. That’s not acceptable.
Our Republican counterparts refuse to acknowledge that running an
election in the middle of a pandemic is going to be difficult; that state
elections systems are going to need more resources and our Post Office must be
well-staffed and prepared to manage an election that will see more voting by
mail than any before.
Yesterday, the Republican Leader scoffed at the idea of extending
enhanced unemployment benefits because it would mean that some Americans
without work would be paid more than our essential workers. Conveniently, the
Republican Leader did not mention that Democrats have proposed, for months,
that we give our essential workers additional hazard pay—and that he and his
party continue to block it.
If our friends on the other side are finally worried about how
little many of our essential workers are making, as we are, I would hope they’d
put their money where their mouth is and support our proposal to give them
hazard pay.
When it comes to elections and education, food assistance for
hungry children, and—mind-bogglingly—when it comes to health care, testing and
tracing and Medicaid, our Republican friends continue to pinch pennies during a
national emergency.
Again, this is the reason that our negotiations with the White
House have been so difficult. The president and his aides and his party in
Congress are not even awake to the crisis in our country. President Trump
doesn’t have a plan, doesn’t engage in negotiations, and still manages to
undercut them at nearly every turn. There is no leadership from the White House
at a time of great crisis. Historians will look back and say this is one of the
greatest crises America has felt and the White House is nowhere to be found.
It's never happened before.
Way back in March, after we passed the CARES Act, the Senate
Republican majority made a dangerous gamble. Leader McConnell said he was
putting the Senate on “pause” to see what would happen. Senate Republicans
swallowed the president’s ridiculous fantasy that the disease would just
disappear.
Hoping they wouldn’t have to do anything, the Republican majority
put the Senate on ice for four long months. Four months. Only yesterday, Leader
McConnell admitted that his delay quote “allowed us to learn the coronavirus
didn’t mysteriously disappear.”
So look, at this late stage, after months of Republican delay as
the country got worse and worse, after Republicans in the Senate failed to
generate a proposal that even their own caucus or president could support,
Democrats are now the ones in the room trying to negotiate a bill that would
meet the country’s needs.
And while some of my friends on the other side of the aisle are
just looking for an outcome, any outcome, so they can vote on something and go
home—we are not going to agree to an inadequate bill that doesn’t address the
challenges in our country.
And we are not going to give up.
We are going to keep fighting until we achieve the caliber of
legislation the American people during this time of great crisis need and
deserve. We are going to keep working until we get it done.
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