It gives me no pleasure to have concluded that the vast majority of Senate Republicans want more economic suffering and for a continuation of the coronavirus pandemic.
The Democrats have proposed a $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package, but Senate Republicans argued this plan is too expensive.
While a group of 10 Senate Republicans has proposed a roughly $618 billion coronavirus-relief package, it lacks the support of the other 40 Republicans in the Senate.
The COVID-19 pandemic has caused one of the worst economic crises in our lifetime.
The latest figures from the Labor Department show America has nearly 10 million fewer jobs than it did before the pandemic hit. The U.S. economy has only recovered around half of the jobs lost in the spring.
And the job losses are still coming. In December, U.S. employment declined by 140,000 and 15.8 million people reported that they were unable to work because their employer closed or lost business due to the pandemic.
On top of an economic crisis, America is facing a health emergency. Cases and hospitalizations related to COVID-19 remain much higher than at any point before the fall/winter surge.
Over 90,000 people in the U.S. are currently hospitalized and over 430,000 Americans have died from the virus.
Considering these grim statistics, what are we to make of the 40 Republican Senator who have not signaled support for any additional COVID economic relief?
The majority of Senate Republicans believe, as Minority Leader McConnell (R-KY) articulated in 2010, that their best chance of gaining back control in Washington, is by ensuring that the Democrats are unable to tackle any of the challenges America is facing.
After President Obama was first elected, Senate Minority Leader McConnell (R-KY) infamously said, “The single most important thing [Republicans] want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president.”
Instead of addressing the fiscal disaster and 14-month recession that President Obama inherited from President Bush, Senator McConnell (R-KY) and his Republican colleagues were focused on ensuring that the first Black President did not win a second term.
Republicans might have gotten away with making Obama a one term president, if they had had more power. Senate Republicans were in the minority for the entirety of Obama’s first term.
Now that the Senate is evenly divided between Democrats and Republicans, with Vice President Harris being able to cast tiebreaking votes, Senator McConnell (R-KY) has greater leverage than he did during Obamas’ first term.
While it appears 10 Republican Senators are flirting with working with the Democrats on COVID relief, it appears unlike that the Democrats will capitulate to their demands for a less robust stimulus package.
In essence, Senate Republicans do not want America to get out of the COVID-19 pandemic and the resulting economic crisis, until they are in power and can take credit for saving America.
The sooner Democrats realize this and stop trying to capitulate to Republican demands, the faster America will be able to tackle the challenges before us.
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