AGENCIES, Washington: North American Senate leaders have reached a deal with the Donald Trump administration on a nearly $2tn stimulus package to help rescue the American economy that has been ravaged by the coronavirus pandemic..
After days of around-the-clock negotiations amongst senators and administration officials, a bipartisan compromise was struck over what is expected to be the largest US economic stimulus it has ever passed.
“We have a deal,” said Eric Ueland, the White House legislative affairs director, just before 1.00am. Ueland added that the details of the bill was being worked out. “We have either, clear, explicit legislative text reflecting all parties or we know exactly where we’re going to land on legislative text as we continue to finish.”
The unprecedented economic rescue package would give direct payments to most Americans, expand unemployment benefits and provide a $367 billion program for small businesses to keep making payroll while workers are forced to stay home.
One of the last issues in the bill factored in $500 billion for guaranteed, subsidized loans to larger industries, including a fight over how generous to be with the airlines. Hospitals would get significant help as well.
At the White House on Tuesday, even as the public-health crisis deepened, President Donald Trump expressed eagerness to nudge many people back to work in coming weeks and held out a prospect, based more on hope than science, that the country could be returning to normal in less than a month.
Although, Trump’s administration recommended Americans curtail activities for 15 days, starting just over a week ago, the president saids he may soon allow parts of the economy, in regions so far less badly hit by the virus, to begin reopening.
Even before the deal was reached, news of the likely but elusive agreement had sent the stock market rocketing on Tuesday.
