President Donald Trump finally signed the $900 billion Covid-19 relief, putting an end to a crisis that threatened to shut down the government.
Millions of people could lose their unemployment insurance if Trump refused to sign the legislative relief package passed by both chambers of Congress.
The $900 billion bill provides aid for individuals and small businesses struggling amid the pandemic.
“I am signing this bill to restore unemployment benefits, stop evictions, provide rental assistance, add money for PPP, return our airline workers back to work, add substantially more money for vaccine distribution, and much more,” the president said in a statement.
On Saturday, Trump called for the stimulus checks to be changed from $600 to $2,000. However, his previous resistance to signing the bill would leave millions of people without unemployment coverage and threaten a government shutdown.
About 10 million Americans would also lose compensation while 3.8 million workers are at risk of losing benefits, Brooking Institute reported.
Andrew Stettner, a senior at the Century Foundation, estimated that around 14 million people would lose aid from the programs if the president would not sign the bill.
“For those who can’t get on another form of benefits the consequences will be swift and dangerous,” Stettner wrote on Twitter.
“These are real families caught up in the maelstrom of the pandemic scouring for shelters to live in, postponing the purchase of lifesaving medicines, and going further and further into debt.”
President Trump criticized the $600 stimulus check and demanded $2,000 checks.
“I simply want to get our great people $2,000, rather than the measly $600 that is now in the bill,” he wrote on Twitter. “Also, stop the billions of dollars in ”pork”.”
A Treasury spokesperson said to CNBC that Trump and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin were in contact throughout negotiations.
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Replaced!