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Biden’s $1.9 Trillion Stimulus Plan Enters Three-Week Congress Dash
www.bloomberg.com

Biden’s $1.9 Trillion Stimulus Plan Enters Three-Week Congress Dash

Democrats begin the final push for President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion stimulus bill this week, dropping any pretense of bipartisanship to quickly pass the package before an earlier round of benefits runs out.

Politics

Democrats begin the final push for President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion stimulus bill this week, dropping any pretense of bipartisanship to quickly pass the package before an earlier round of benefits runs out.

This will be the first real test for Democrats’ full control of government since former President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial, with implications for the rest of Biden’s agenda and the pandemic-battered economy. The House plans to vote as soon as Friday on Democrats’ stimulus package, setting up a Senate vote as soon as next week.

Resolving the final hurdles, especially disagreement among Senate Democrats about a provision phasing in a $15-per-hour federal minimum wage, would clear the way for Biden to give his first address to a joint session of Congress in March outlining his next policy goals, including a multitrillion-dollar infrastructure bill.

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“The Senate is on track to send a robust $1.9 trillion package to the president’s desk before the March 14 expiration of unemployment insurance benefits” from the last round of stimulus, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a Friday letter to colleagues. “We will meet this deadline.”

In public, the focus will be on the House this week with a Budget Committee vote Monday and a floor vote on the bill as soon as Friday. The content of the 591-page bill is mostly locked in -- the Budget Committee isn’t even allowed to make substantive changes when it meets at 1 p.m. -- and there’s no sign of a rebellion by the few remaining Democratic deficit hawks imperiling the bill on the floor.

The real action will be behind closed doors in the Senate, where Democratic leaders are hammering out the changes needed to get all 50 Senate Democrats and independents on board.