Washington, Dec 5: US President-elect Joe Biden on Friday urged Congress to pass the USD 900 billion stimulus package required to provide relief to people and small businesses who have been badly hit by the coronavirus pandemic.
“Americans need help, and they need it now, and they need more to come early next year,” Biden said at a speech in Wilmington in Delaware, noting that he is encouraged by the bipartisan efforts in the Senate for the economic relief bill of about USD 900 billion.
“It’s a bipartisan effort. If Congress as they work out the details of this relief package they’re going to have to focus on resources for direct public-health responses to COVID-19. We need meaningful funding for vaccines now, so don’t lose time and leave people waiting for additional months. We need serious funding for testing now,” he said.
“We need to ramp up testing to allow our schools and businesses to operate safely. The sooner we pass the funding, the sooner we can turn the corner on COVID-19,” said Biden, who will take oath as the 46th president of the United States on January 20.
“As we inherit the public health and economic crisis, we are working on a plan that we will put forward for the next Congress to move fast to control the pandemic, to revive the economy, and to build back better than before. We hope to see the same kind of spirit of bipartisan cooperation as we are seeing today,” he said.
Biden said that there is a consensus that as the country battles COVID-19, they have to make sure that businesses and workers have the tools, the resources, and the guidance health and safety standards to keep businesses and schools open safely.
“It can be done because here’s the deal the fight against COVID won’t be won by January in January alone. To truly end this crisis Congress is going to need to fund more testing as well as a more equitable and free distribution of the vaccine. We need more economic relief to bridge through 2021 until this pandemic, and economic crisis are over. And then we need to build back better,” he said.
“We can create an economic recovery for all, for everybody. We can move from crisis to recovery and to resurgence. For the Lord’s sake, this is the United States of America. We’ve done it before and we’ll do it again,” he said.
Biden said that millions of people have lost their jobs or had their hours slashed. They have lost their health insurance or are in danger of losing their health insurance. One in every six renters is behind in rent. One in four small businesses can’t keep their doors open.
Noting that over the past three months, 2.3 million more people are long-term unemployed, Biden said that this is a dire jobs report. “It is a snapshot I might remind you up to mid-November before the surge in COVID cases we predicted. Many predicted, and the deaths rise that we have seen in December as we head into a very dark winter ahead,” he said.
Responding to a question, Biden said that he is confident there are a sufficient number of Democrats and Republicans in the US Senate along with significant votes coming out of the House of Representatives to put together a serious package that will keep them from going off the edge here, provide the kind of resources they have needed immediately.
“It’s not going to satisfy everybody, but the option is if you insist on everything, you’re likely to get nothing on both sides,” he said. (PTI)
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