This is something that we have already discussed in the past but it bears repeating. We’re not sure what has taken Trump so long to make this promise but it will do more to help him than he could ever realize. In fact, all of the posturing that he has done when it comes to “law and order” would fall by the wayside if he is able to push this through.
Sure, people want to feel safe in their own country and we would never diminish that. Those feelings are very valid. However, it is much harder to focus on matters of personal safety when you do not know where your next mortgage payment is coming from. Senate Republican arms are about to be twisted and we can’t wait to see where it goes from here.
We have been saying that Trump needed to offer up a new coronavirus stimulus package if he wants to bolster his chances of being re-elected in November. This seemed obvious to us but the Republicans seemed surprisingly fine with blowing the deadline to continue the $600 enhancements. Maybe this was their plan all along?
A stimulus payment this close to the election is sure to bring him more goodwill than his tweets about various other American issues. That’s not to say that he is wrong about what he is saying but people need money and they need it now. Of course, Senate Republicans were already quick to reply to his tweet with messages about the importance of fiscal resolve.
Democrats are “heartless”. They don’t want to give STIMULUS PAYMENTS to people who desperately need the money, and whose fault it was NOT that the plague came in from China. Go for the much higher numbers, Republicans, it all comes back to the USA anyway (one way or another!).
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 16, 2020
At a certain point, it just seems like the Senate Republicans are playing a dangerous game of chicken. The Democrats are fine with allowing this stalemate to play on because they can simply tell their voters that they were blocked from providing assistance. It’s no sweat off their backs. Meanwhile, the Senate Republicans are acting as if Trump’s request is a no go.
“If the number gets too high, anything that got passed in the Senate will be passed mostly with Democrat votes and a handful of Republicans so it’s gonna have to stay within a realistic range if we want to maximize, optimize the number of Republican senators that will vote for it,” said Senator John Thune.
“We did the right thing. The president has his opinion, we have ours,” says Senator Ron Johnson and this sums it up for the Senate Republicans. This is where the president should be calling their respective bluffs. We’re sure that he already has a tweet in the drafts about this one. The party clearly understands the stakes at the moment but they seem content to let this play out.
The latter was a big factor in the $600 benefit expiring. You had people in Trump's ear explicitly arguing it was holding an otherwise roaring economy back. https://t.co/ANu0TyuNSu
— Benjy Sarlin (@BenjySarlin) September 16, 2020
The latter was a big factor in the $600 benefit expiring. You had people in Trump's ear explicitly arguing it was holding an otherwise roaring economy back. https://t.co/ANu0TyuNSu
— Benjy Sarlin (@BenjySarlin) September 16, 2020
President Trump already knows that this is a gross miscalculation. He still may be able to get it done, though. The Democratic contingent only needs 13 Republicans to pass their bill. If the president is unable to find at least a dozen Republicans that he can rely on right now, he may as well throw in the towel. His tenure as president is all but over at that point.
If anything, Trump should have been pushing for a second, more robust stimulus package long before now. By waiting until now, he is giving people the chance to notice the political aspect. There’s no real evidence that rioting will scare people into voting for him. His passiveness on this key issue may end up being the one that costs him the election. His willingness to engage in magical thinking could be his downfall.
Trump believes that he can speak things into existence, whether it’s an American society that is free of COVID-19 or a return to the economy that we enjoyed before the pandemic. He’s been blaming the nation’s economic losses on the health restrictions that the virus has caused, instead of the virus. He did not want to hand Pelosi a victory during the early negotiations. His re-election may now depend on his ability to get Senate Republicans to play ball.
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