Pelosi says House will move immediately on COVID-19 relief
A House vote on Biden’s big coronavirus relief package could be coming soon.
House Democrats have rearranged their schedule over the next two weeks, scrapping votes next week to allow the relevant committees to consider the various provisions of their emerging COVID-19 relief package. Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) suggested that package could hit the House floor as early as the week of Feb. 1.
“We’re getting ready for a COVID relief package. We’ll be working on that as we go,” she told reporters in the Capitol. “We’ll be doing our … committee work all next week so that we are completely ready to go to the floor when we come back.”
A Pelosi aide emphasized that no floor vote has been scheduled.
Biden last week had unveiled a $1.9 trillion emergency relief package, which features many of the wish-list items contained in earlier proposals from Pelosi and House Democrats.
That list includes hundreds of billions of dollars to develop and distribute COVID-19 vaccines, hike unemployment benefits, provide $1,400 in direct payments to qualified Americans and help state and local governments cope financially with the ongoing crisis, which has killed more than 400,000 people in the United States alone.