Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee Endorses Boosting Covid Relief to $2,000, but Blasts Trump for Being ‘MIA… Nowhere to Be Found’ for Last Six Months

Texas Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee (D) called out President Donald Trump’s 11th-hour conversion to endorsing bigger Covid relief payments, after he balked all summer at the prospect of another round of stimulus and essentially disappeared from negotiations since Election Day.

In early spring, House Democrats passed a $3 trillion HEROES Act that included thousands of dollars of additional direct checks to struggling Americans, but in the intervening months, both Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell threw up obstacles and winnowed its scope down. As the pandemic exploded again in recent weeks, however, the need for emergency relief became critical and, after bipartisan Congressional negotiations, the House and Senate passed a $900 billion stimulus bill on Monday — by huge, veto-proof margins — that would included $600 direct payments for middle- and lower-income Americans and their dependent children.

Trump, however, jeopardized all those weeks of talks in an instant on Tuesday, releasing a short, ransom-like video that demanded Congress amend the bill it has already passed to increase that amount to $2,000. Though he did not explicitly threaten to veto the current bill, the implication he would not sign it without changes was clear.

“Remember, the president was the one to call off relief negotiations just before the election,” CNN Tonight guest host Laura Coates noted. “He said he would get back to after he won. Well, the president lost. And ever since, he has been holed up in the White House.”

“After all the work, all the gridlock, months and months, the president now coming up and posturing in this way. It feels outrageous,” Coates said.

Jackson Lee echoed that sentiment, highlighting the months of obstruction House Democrats faced after their stimulus passed back in May.

“Over six months ago, Democrats placed on the table a $3 trillion package that would have saved lives, would have provided a stop gap to food insecurity, stop people from being evicted ” she explained. “The president was M.I.A. He was nowhere to be found. He was not interested. He didn’t engage and his friends in the United States Senate put a red light and a stop sign in front of the American people.”

“So where do we stand right now?” Coates followed up. “Even the prospect of that number increasing, even though it’s what Democrats wanted to take place in the first instance.”

“We offered that way back five months ago, you’re absolutely right. So many of us have documentation saying we want $2,000 or $2,500,” Jackson Lee confirmed. “What we see now is simply a banished man who has left the public scene. He has abdicated his duties and now it’s a moment for him to again take the stage and such an ill-fated manner. And as the Speaker said, say what it is and we’ll do it by unanimous consent to put it on the floor.”

But the congresswoman then pointed out that Trump’s demand is an empty one if he can’t get the Republican Senate to agree.

“Bring Senator McConnell to the table and you can be sure that Democrats, who will be first to stand up for the American people, will be there and we will vote on Christmas day if it’s necessary,” she emphasized. “This is about him. Remember the phrase he just said: ‘And I’ll be the president to make it happen.’ It is weeks of seething and sulking and finding ways to break the rule of law, to undermine the Constitution and now desperate people, desperately in need of food, and he is playing with families with children, and food. I don’t think we should have it. The American people shouldn’t have it. We want more than $600 and we’ve heard President-Elect [Joe] Biden say when he is in office, we will go back to the the table again. We didn’t get to do [aid for] local governments, who are on the brink of gonig to bankruptcy. Why? Because the president was absent. He talked about blue cities and red states and his Republican friends said the same. In the midst of this beautiful holiday season, we came home to give to the American people, and now we have someone isolated in the White House, who wants to interject what Americans cannot understand.”

Watch the video above, via CNN.

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