Speaking on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, Democratic Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi said she believe a coronavirus relief package could be negotiated between Democrats and the White House before Election Day.
Addressing the partisan divide in Washington that is preventing aid from moving forward, Pelosi noted that in the last few days of negotiations, the White House has agreed to adopt a “science-based approach to take on the virus, not based in politics, but based in science.”
This was a change from the position advocated by the White House and its chief negotiator, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, who pushed political outcomes rather than public health outcomes as the basis for their proposals.
Democrats’ priority, Pelosi said was, “Crush the virus. We’ll never be able to reopen the economy and schools without making an effort to defeat it,” where as republicans wanted to open the economy first and deal with the virus second.
Noting that the priority of Democrats is to make schools the safest places in the country for students and teachers, Pelosi said that fighting the virus can be a unifying effort for the nation, reaching across the political aisle.
But the slog to negotiate a relief bill was difficult because of the political-based position republican maintained. Pelosi said republicans insisted on taking out language relating to people of color in the coronavirus relief bill, even through Black and minority populations are disproportionately impacted by the coronavirus.
Pelosi said we have to work together to go forward, unifying us to fight to the coronavirus.
Help is on the way. It will be better. It will be bolder and it will be retroactive. While they’re working on solutions, “we shouldn’t be making matters worse, and that’s what republicans are doing: making matters worse.”
Pelosi held out hope that there would be a coronavirus relief package by election day, and one that would be passed through the House. She would not say the likelihood of it passing the Senate, saying that they’re negotiating with the White House, which implicitly means the Trump Administration would be responsible for gathering republican support in the Senate for the bill, a feat Senate Majority Leader republican Mitch McConnell has been unable or unwilling to do.
Host Joe Scarborough asked how difficult it is to negotiate in good faith during such a politicized environment, saying “[Trump is acting] like an Eastern European totalitarian thug who wants to arrest his opponent two weeks before the election.”
Pelosi commented that “the total disregard he has for the Constitution is sad,” saying that Trump has a number of supporters, in and out of the government, who prefer to please him instead of serving the people.
Pelosi said she hopes “[traditional] republicans take back the party, the Grand Old Party.”