Biden meets struggling workers, calls for more Covid relief amid economic crisis



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President-elect Joe Biden used a virtual roundtable on Wednesday with economically struggling workers and small business owners due to the worsening coronavirus pandemic to offer another unqualified call for more Covid-19 stimulus .

During the often moving event, Biden repeatedly comforted the four attendees – a school crossing guard in Chicago, a stadium worker in Detroit, a restaurateur in Milwaukee, and a machinist in Atlanta – and promised he was pushing the Current Congress to adopt a spending program. and would lobby for another after his swearing-in next month.

“We need to get help as soon as possible,” Biden said, adding that he had “urged” Republicans in Congress “to work on a bipartisan emergency plan” immediately.

This week, a bipartisan group of lawmakers put forward a $ 908 billion temporary coronavirus relief proposal – a much lower amount than Democrats had hoped for, but Democratic leaders said on Wednesday they would support as a base of a final agreement. The proposal includes more unemployment benefits, but does not include another round of direct payments to families.

Biden, speaking from Wilmington, Delaware, said on Wednesday that any package passed before he took office on Jan. 20 would be “just a down payment” for what he wants to do “early next year.”

Throughout the event, the four workers at Biden repeatedly pleaded with the federal government for additional stimulus, describing, often cruelly, the economic hardships they endured during the pandemic.

In one particularly emotional moment, the Detroit stadium worker began to cry, describing she felt “desperate.”

“It’s hard to try to keep up with the bills,” she says. “We are really suffering.”

“We don’t know what tomorrow will bring, if any help will come,” the woman said.

Biden later urged people not to travel during the upcoming holidays due to the raging pandemic.

“You can’t travel on this vacation as much as you want,” he says.

Earlier today, Biden received the daily presidential briefing, as did Vice President-elect Kamala Harris. The briefs, which they began receiving on Monday, contain high-level intelligence and analysis on a range of national security issues.

  • A transition official told NBC News that Biden could announce his health team as early as next week, including his choices to lead health and human services, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the response team. coronavirus from the incoming administration. Jeff Zients, who led President Barack Obama’s National Economic Council and co-chair of Biden’s transition team, is a key contender for the response team’s leadership.
  • As NBC previously reported, former Obama surgeon general Vivek Murthy is a top contender for HHS secretary, as is Rhode Island housekeeper Gina Raimondo, according to a transition official. But New Mexico governor Michelle Lujan Grisham was not at the top of the shortlist, people familiar with the matter said.
  • For the education secretary, Sonja Santelises, CEO of the Baltimore public school system, and Linda Darling-Hammond, a professor at the Stanford Graduate School of Education, are being strongly considered, a transition official said. The shortlist also includes two leaders of teachers’ unions: former National Education Association president Lily Eskelsen García and American Federation of Teachers director Randi Weingarten, NBC News reported.
  • Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms is one of the best to lead the Small Business Administration, two sources familiar with the matter said. The SBA administrator will be elevated to a Cabinet-level position in the incoming administration, sources said.
  • Instead of attending Biden’s inauguration and swearing-in ceremony on January 20, President Donald Trump plans to announce a 2024 campaign to take over the White House.
  • Trump released a 46-minute video in which he repeated many of the baseless allegations of voter fraud and complaints about mail-in ballots that he and his legal team have been touting for weeks. The video was posted by both Twitter and Facebook.
  • Biden filled his senior staff for the inaugural committee on Wednesday with former campaign communications and finance assistants, including his new deputy White House communications director Pili Tobar and his former campaign national finance director, Katie Petrelius.
  • Former Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale, who was demoted in July and ultimately resigned in September following an incident with police at his Florida home, gave his first interview since resigning to Fox News Tuesday. He said Trump’s biggest misstep was his handling of the coronavirus, saying, “I thought we should have empathy from the public. I think people are afraid.
  • Trump has discussed the possibility of granting pardons to his family members and some close associates, several sources familiar with the matter told NBC News.
  • Federal investigators are investigating a possible “bribery for pardon” system involving presidential pardons, according to federal court documents unsealed by the chief justice of the Federal Court in Washington on Tuesday. The redacted documents do not name the people involved or Trump, and do not indicate whether White House officials were aware of the scheme.
  • Georgia Election Officer Gabriel Sterling, a Republican, pleaded with the President and other Republicans on Tuesday to condemn the words of Trump campaign lawyer Joe DiGenova for saying the former cybersecurity official of Trump, Christopher Krebs, should be shot.
  • Attorney General William Barr said on Tuesday that there had been no evidence of widespread voter fraud in the election, telling The Associated Press: “To date we have not seen any election fraud. scale which could have had a different result in the election. ”

New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman said he spoke to Biden on Tuesday night about a host of issues his incoming government was facing, and the president-elect said his top priority was to secure a deal stimulus via Congress even before taking office early next year. Biden also opened up about his relationship with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.

“When McConnell controlled the Senate, there were a number of things people said they couldn’t do, and I was able to do them with [him]. I was able to get them, you know, to raise taxes on the rich, “Biden told Friedman.” I think there are compromises, that not all compromises stray from principle, ”Biden added. He knows me. I know him. I’m not asking him to bother to make a deal.

Reacting to GOP lawmakers disparaging Neera Tanden, Biden’s candidate for management office and budget director, for her “nasty” tweets, Biden said: “This disqualifies almost all Republican senators and 90% of the administration.”

“But by the way, she’s smart as hell. Yeah I think they gon ‘pick a few people just to fight [over] no matter what, ”he added.

The only event on Trump’s official schedule on Wednesday was lunch with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.



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