As discussions surrounding a $908 billion bipartisan stimulus bill continue on Capitol Hill, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who just last week rejected the proposal, seems to be warming up to the package. As a growing number of congressional lawmakers back the relief plan, McConnell on Tuesday suggested that negotiators temporarily drop the two most contentious provisions that have delayed the bill’s approval: liability protections and aid for state and local governments.
Speaking to reporters, McConnell, who has his own scaled-back proposal in play, suggested that in an effort to approve the bill before the end of the year, the two provisions be dropped from the package. McConnell said, “What I recommend is we set aside liability and set aside state and local and pass those things that we can agree on,” according to Yahoo! Money. He suggested that those two provisions could wait and lawmakers could again discuss them at the state of 2021, stating, “we’ll be back at this after the first of the year.”
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Liability protection and aid for state and local governments have been a sticking point for lawmakers for far longer than the bipartisan bill’s existence. In fact, those two provisions have been the faltering points for many bills that had come before it, including the GOP-proposed HEALS Act, negotiations for which eventually collapsed over disagreements on the overall price tag and certain provisions included, such as liability protection.
Liability protections would put in place federal limits on Covid-19 related lawsuits against businesses. The provision has been supported by Republicans, who have made it among their top priorities to put such protections in place until as far as the end of 2024. Democrats, however, dubbed the move a “poison pill” of any proposed legislation. State and local aid, meanwhile, has been supported by Democrats, though rejected by Republicans, including President Donald Trump, who accused Democrats of wanting to “bail out” blue states.
In response to McConnell’s suggestion that such aid be dropped from negotiations, at least temporarily, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said that “the state and local funding provided by the state and local funding provisions have broad bipartisan support, unlike the extreme corporate liability proposal.” Mark Harkins, a former Democratic congressional staffer and a senior fellow at Georgetown’s Government Affairs Institute, however, acknowledged to Yahoo! Money that McConnell’s suggestion “is an intriguing offer that the Democrats will need to consider carefully.”
At this time, it remains unclear if the bipartisan package will be able to pass both chambers of Congress. McConnell, making his suggestion Tuesday, said “we can’t leave without doing a COVID bill. The country needs it.”
