Senate Democrats make plans for another stimulus package

Eleven Senate Democrats are pushing President Joe Biden to put recurring direct payments and enhanced jobless benefits in the economic recovery plan he will try to pass this year.

In a letter to the president announced Tuesday, the lawmakers said Congress should not cut off additional support to workers while the economy recovers from Covid. Though the senators did not say how large they want the payments to be or how often they want them to come, they said they hope the aid will phase out only as the job market improves.

“This crisis is far from over, and families deserve certainty that they can put food on the table and keep a roof over their heads,” the senators wrote. “Families should not be at the mercy of constantly-shifting legislative timelines and ad hoc solutions.”

Biden is expected to outline his recovery plan in the coming weeks after Congress passes Democrats’ $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package. The proposal is expected to include plans to revamp U.S. infrastructure and boost manufacturing as the country tries to regain its footing after the pandemic.

The 11 senators believe households will also need more direct aid to get to the other side of the crisis. The letter was backed by Senate Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden, D-Ore., Senate Budget Committee Chair Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., Senate Banking Committee Chair Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey, D-Mass., Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., Sen. Michael Bennet, D-Colo., Sen. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Calif., and Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn.

Democrats, who narrowly control both chambers of Congress, would have to pass the legislation through budget reconciliation. They are using the process, which enables them to approve bills without Republicans in the Senate, to pass their coronavirus aid plan.

It is unclear now if the recurring payments could win the support of the most conservative Senate Democrats. The party needs every member on board to win a simple majority in the 50-50 Senate. Sens. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., have expressed concerns about both the scope of $1,400 direct payments and the $15 per hour federal minimum wage initially included in the pandemic relief bill.

Senate Democrats led by Wyden have called for benefits to stay in place until the economy improves. They do not want Americans to see a sudden loss of support as they did last summer, when expanded unemployment insurance lapsed.

A $300 per week jobless aid supplement approved in December, along with provisions extending unemployment insurance to millions more Americans, will formally expire March 14. The rescue bill, which Democrats hope to get to Biden’s desk by the end of next week, would increase the enhanced jobless benefit to $400 a week and keep the unemployment programs in place through Aug. 29.

Republicans have opposed major spending as part of the current coronavirus relief package. Ahead of the House’s passage of the $1.9 trillion bill early Saturday, they argued their counterparts included wasteful spending not needed to reopen businesses and schools.

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[jackshipman]

How about you come up with a stimulus package that DOESN’T go to other countries

[inboxnews]

What a mess. They're digging a hole for us so deep we won't ever get out.

[fabienmerteuil]

They implement stimulus every time there’s a hiccup are they out of their mind?

[thomasdahman]

How about pass one before planning a second?

[ScaredGames]

Create jobs, trow plans of infrastructure in different states, printing more money and giving free money to the people is going push us to a great crisis for years.

[daveyjones]

Spend, spend, spend!!! (Pork, pork, pork)

[RETUSAF]

Just make checks to Americans recurring for the next year.

[mjlcolson]

Delay! Delay! Delay! Again wake up people...

[garterhead]

Our system is a joke it’s really all about rich people dragging there feet while the citizens sit waiting for a relief. I’m glad my job was not affected. I feel sorry for the people who have faith in these politicians.

[armedanddangerous]

Hello, I'm a grand mother caring full time for a 6 year old. I lost my job due to covid and everyday I worry about not having enough food and being evicted. Once my car broke down and is cost $1300 to be repaired and this began my cycle of not paying rent . May God 🙏 help us all.

[rp]

Hey Congress, where's the ONE TRILLION STILL LEFT FROM PRESIDENT TRUMP'S stimulus package

[morepower]

Americans need a tyrant government relief package

[dfgyuhdd]

Inflation will skyrocket and yet many Americans will be unable to put 2 and 2 together and realize that maybe we should not have allowed this pork behemoth to happen.

[aishwaryasingh]

I am not from usa and Americans reading it, I just want to know, ,, the PEW report states that more than 74 percent Americans want this relief package. Is it correct?

[rainandaprilwillis]

Why make another stimulus package when you can't even get the $1, 400 out ?
Screw Republicans and Democrats.
Everyone shouldn't vote neither party for 2024. Let's see what happens... That would be the best Epic moment in history

[shootinblanks]

Burned by not getting unemployment extension? Here’s a thought, go back to work

[gwebocelestron]

Biden's past activities:

In June 2014, Vice President Joe Biden announced the launch of the Caribbean Energy Security Initiative (CESI). The program called for increasing access to financing for Caribbean energy projects that he strongly supported. American taxpayer dollars were dedicated to facilitating deals that matched U.S. government financing with local energy projects in Caribbean countries, including Jamaica. In January 2015, Biden hosted CESI in Washington, D.C., bringing together leaders from across the region to discuss energy issues and in particular, renewable energy. One primary focus of the conference was local and international dealmakers needing help to bring renewable energy projects to the Caribbean region. USAID announced that it would be spending $10 million to boost renewable energy projects in Jamaica over the next five years. After Joe Biden brought together leaders for CESI, brother Frank’s firm Sun Fund Americas announced that it was “engaged in projects and is in negotiations with governments of other countries in the [Caribbean] region for both its Solar and Waste to Energy development services. As if to push the idea along, the Obama administration’s OPIC provided a $47.5 million loan to support the construction of a 20-megawatt solar facility in Clarendon, Jamaica. When the deal was announced, U.S. ambassador to Jamaica Luis G. Moreno noted that the project “wouldn’t be possible without OPIC financing. Frank Biden’s Sun Fund Americas later announced that it had signed a power purchase agreement (PPA) to build a 20-megawatt solar facility in Jamaica.

Hunter Biden was involved in two billion-dollar deals with Chinese government–connected firms in a twenty-month period while his dad was vice president of the United States. Hunter was apparently eager to strike other deals with the Chinese—business implicitly leveraged on who his father was. Consider the case of Patrick Ho, who was arrested in late 2017 by federal agents in New York for money laundering and violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. Ho was an assistant to Chinese oil tycoon Ye Jianming, who ran the energy company CEFC. The company has strong ties to the Chinese military. Ho was also the secretary-general of the China Energy Fund Committee, which is a Chinese government-directed entity. CEFC officials had met multiple times with Hunter Biden beginning back in 2015. In May 2017, Hunter met with Ho in Miami, where they reportedly discussed joint energy and infrastructure deals in the United States.

Hunter Biden’s Rosemont Seneca Partners finalized a deal with the Chinese government worth a whopping $1 billion. The deal was later expanded to $1.5 billion. It is important to note that this deal was with the Chinese government—not with a Chinese company, which means that the Chinese government and the son of the vice president were now business partners. They created was a joint venture called Bohai Harvest RST (BHR). The name reflected who was involved: the “RS” was a reference to Rosemont Seneca; the “T” was the Thornton Group, a small U.S. investment firm that did business in China. It was a very unusual arrangement: the most powerful financial institution in China, the Bank of China, was setting up a joint venture with Rosemont Seneca Partners. When the Chinese government’s BHR was established, Hunter Biden was given a slot on the board of directors. BHR, with Hunter Biden on the board of directors, engaged in a series of financial deals that served the strategic interests of Beijing. In one of their first deals, the firm took an ownership stake in China General Nuclear Power Corporation (CGN), a nuclear energy company. The company was charged in 2016 with espionage against the United States. BHR was the first of a series of business relationships that Hunter Biden established with the Chinese government or Chinese government–connected entities.

Just about a year after the massive deal with the Chinese government’s Bohai Harvest, another Hunter Biden firm, Rosemont Realty, struck a pact with another Chinese government–linked firm called Gemini Investments. This deal involved a multibillion-dollar investment in Rosemont. Gemini Investments’ director and honorary chairman is Li Ming. His corporate and political ties in Beijing go to the highest levels of the Communist Party. By December 2014, Gemini Investments inked the new partnership with Rosemont Realty, under which they would acquire an interest in the company and its underlying properties. Eight months later, the newly christened Gemini-Rosemont announced its plans for $3 billion worth of new acquisitions.

Consider the case of something called mbloom, a joint venture that Hunter Biden set up in Hawaii. Mbloom was a “public-private partnership” in which Hunter’s firm invested $5 million and the other half came from the Hawaii Strategic Development Corporation (HSDC). But where did HSDC get its money for mbloom? It came from a program back in Washington, D.C., called the Treasury Department State Small Business Credit Initiative. Three million dollars of the HSDC money came from the program, which was run by a longtime Biden aide named Don Graves. It is hard to find someone tighter in the Biden orbit than Graves. Over the course of his career, he has served as counselor to Vice President Biden, his domestic and economic policy director, and as his traveling chief of staff. After Joe Biden left the White House, he appointed Graves to the policy advisory board of the Biden Institute.

Hunter was also deeply involved with a troubling entity called Burnham Financial Group. Two Chinese companies also became involved with Burnham. Kirin Global Enterprise Limited, a mysterious investment vehicle run by Xiangyao (or Yaojun) “Larry” Liu and Guo Jianfeng, was one that invested in Biden’s company. Another firm, Harvest Global Investors, a Chinese investment firm linked to the government in Beijing. Burnham Asset Management became the center of a federal investigation involving a $60 million fraud scheme against one of the poorest Indian tribes in America, the Oglala Sioux.


After reading this do you understand the Biden family? Do you think that Biden destroying the US energy sector and our energy independence has anything to do with him setting up deals through his family members' connections to Chinese energy companies to replace our production of our own energy and that there's a reason Beijing Biden is giving China access to our energy grid? He's setting up deals through which his family will profit at the expense of US energy workers and us through our tax dollars going towards these Biden family deals with China. 


“Come on, man, ” Biden said. “They’re not bad folks, folks, but guess what. They’re not competition for us.”

[robertroland]

Should've waited until after the tax season deadline to pass the second stimulus, and not just made for those unemployed. Those who risked their lives working through the pandemic deserves that money too!

[shockcityrocker]

They ought to issue stimulus in the form of Bitcoin. Least it’d retain some value.

[britishone]

Is it true federal employees will receive 15 weeks of stimulus payments? I sure hope not.