WASHINGTON – The Trump administration is asking Congress to approve a massive economic stimulus package of around $850 billion to stanch the economic free-fall caused by the coronavirus, four officials familiar with the planning said Tuesday.
Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin will present details to Senate Republicans later Tuesday. The package would be mostly devoted to flooding the economy with cash, through a payroll tax cut or other mechanism, two of the officials said, with some $50 billion directed specifically to helping the airline industry. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations.
Mnuchin would like to see the package pass the Senate by the end of the week, he told senators Monday evening in a meeting at the Capitol.
“I think the assumption’s going to be that we’re going to do something, it should be big. Because we can’t assume that we’re just going to keep coming back,” Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., said Monday night leaving a meeting with Mnuchin and other administration officials.
Rubio said aid to airlines was likely to be included. “We still need to get people around the country. I have no doubt that’s going to be a major feature of the next step.”
It’s unclear how warmly the design of the White House’s proposal will be received. Trump has for several weeks pushed Congress to cut or eliminate the payroll tax, which is paid by employees and employers and funds Social Security and Medicare benefits. Many Democrats have complained that such a tax cut would not necessarily directly benefit people who have lost jobs because of the coronavirus crisis. But lawmakers have, in recent days, talked about the need for a huge economic package to stabilize the economy, and it’s likely that some ideas are being revisited.
The attempt to inject a massive amount of money into the economy is reminiscent of the bailouts and stimulus steps Congress took during the economic crisis more than a decade ago. This time around, with everyday life in America screeching to a halt, the intervention may need to be faster and even more extreme. In 2008, Congress passed a $700 billion package, called the Troubled Asset Relief Program, to try and rescue the financial system. – read more
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