House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of Calif. arrives on Capitol Hill, Thursday, April 23, 2020, in Washington.
Andrew Harnik | AP
The House had the votes to pass a $484 billion package Thursday to bolster small businesses and hospitals ravaged by the coronavirus crisis and expand testing desperately needed to start the return to normal life.
Donning face coverings and voting in alphabetical sets to cut the risk of infection, representatives were set to approve the bill easily. The House will send the proposal to President Donald Trump, who is set to sign it into law in the coming hours.
Before the chamber voted on the plan to try to rescue a crumbling U.S. economy, it also approved a Democratic-majority select subcommittee to oversee the Trump administration’s use of a $500 billion pool of aid for corporations, states and municipalities. Between votes, House staff swept through the chamber to clean and disinfect it.
Once signed into law, the legislation will bring the government’s total emergency response to an unprecedented total of more than $2.5 trillion across four bills. After days of sniping over what the measure should include, lawmakers replenished a key $350 billion small business aid program that dried up last week.
The bill includes:
- $310 billion in new funds for the so-called Paycheck Protection Program, which gives small firms loans that could be forgiven if they use them on wages, benefits, rent and utilities. Within that pool, $60 billion will specifically go to small lenders, a priority Democrats pushed for after they blocked a $250 billion funding bill earlier this month.
- $60 billion for Small Business Administration disaster assistance loans and grants.
- $75 billion in grants to hospitals overwhelmed by a rush of Covid-19 patients.
- $25 billion to bolster coronavirus testing, a core piece of any plan to restart the U.S. economy.
The bill’s passage likely will not end the government’s response to the outbreak or disagreements about how best to reduce the devastating toll on Americans’ health and paychecks. The first round of small businesses funding got committed just days after it became available — though it is unclear how many companies have actually received it — and the new money could also dry up quickly.
Democrats have pushed for an additional bill to send money to states and municipalities asking the federal government to help them cover budget crunches created by the pandemic, among other priorities for the party. While Trump has said he supports passing the aid, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said this week that he supports allowing states to declare bankruptcy instead.
The destruction coronavirus has wrought shows in mounting infections, deaths, layoffs and furloughs. The U.S. now has more than 850,000 Covid-19 cases, and the disease has killed at least 47,000 people, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University.
More than 26 million people have filed for unemployment insurance over the latest five-week period, according to government data released Thursday. While some states will start to reopen — against the wishes of Trump administration health officials — many more will keep businesses shuttered for weeks longer to slow the disease’s spread.
This story is developing. Please check back for updates.