Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has been "mocking" the House Democrats' $3 trillion coronavirus relief bill for weeks while it sits on his desk, but he can't produce a bill that all Republicans support, Senate Minority Whip Dick Durbin said Thursday.
"The Republican Senate Conference is in disarray at this moment," the Illinois Democrat said on MSNBC's "Morning Joe." "There's been reports that 20 of them will not vote for a single penny of relief. There was a time where we thought it will never reach a point where anyone wants to shut down the government. Now we reach the prospect of if not damaging, but shutting down the economy if Sen. McConnell cannot get his Republicans together."
This means McConnell must accept the "political reality" that he can't broker something that will pass with Republican votes, said Durbin, and that a bipartisan package must be reached.
"The CARES Act passed the Senate 95-0," said Durbin. "At this point, Sen. McConnell will not sit in the same room with [Sen.] Chuck Schumer and [House Speaker] Nancy Pelosi, literally. To think this is going on when we have up to 30 million Americans about to see a dramatic cut in their unemployment benefits is unforgivable. At some point, Sen. McConnell has to swallow his pride and sit down and start negotiating on a bipartisan basis."
There are some fundamental points that much be reached, including dramatically increasing COVID-19 testing and making results come out faster if schools are expected to be opened this fall.
There are also Republicans pushing back against extending unemployment benefits because it takes away people's incentive to return to work, Durbin said, but that's not true.
"In this economy, the contraction of this economy, folks would love to go back to work, but they're just not out there," said Durbin. "This notion that if you're not rich, you might be lazy in America, I can't get that at all. Look at these people coming into food banks, folks who used to give dollar contributions to the food pantries are now turning around and asking for food for their families. That is the reality."
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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