Is This What Nancy Pelosi Was Holding Out For?
By: Kevin Breidenbach
Tags: Politics, Policy, Stimulus Package, Nancy Pelosi, Opinion

Back in September, myself and others speculated that Nancy Pelosi’s refusal to vote on the stimulus bill that was on the table seemed like it could be a ploy to withhold a “win” from Trump before the election. In a podcast interview with Kara Swisher around that time, she said that “the president does not want to legislate and just wants to have his name on a check, that ain’t going to happen.” She also claimed that it would be a poor strategic move, because “the Republicans would like to pass something like that and say forget about it.” Apparently, she thought it was a better idea to just do nothing at all, while millions slide into poverty, go hungry, and face evictions in wintertime during a pandemic.

Now, Pelosi’s recent insistence that this wasn’t a mistake, as well as her comments regarding “a new president” seem to indicate further that this was indeed a political game. Any protests she may have had about actually being concerned about the size or contents of the bill ring hollow when you consider that this proposal is much smaller than the one from several months ago, leaves out another round of $1,200 checks for the people, and leaves in liability protections for corporations. If it wasn’t a mistake, how else are we to take the fact that she essentially held out for a worse deal, other than as a political game? She is, after all, regarded as a “master legislator,” so certainly she could have seen this coming, as did everyone else who was paying attention.

The new plan does reportedly include $300 in weekly federal unemployment benefits for four months. However, as workers pointed out when the original $600 weekly enhancement was first expiring and Trump did his stopgap executive order, that $300 doesn’t go far. There is also a conspicuous absence of any mention of protections for workers who refuse to return to work for reasons of COVID safety, a situation which previously led to some workers being told they had to pay back thousands in “overpayment,” even when such protections were supposed to be in place under the CARES Act. At least some of those cases have been cleared up in favor of the workers, but without protections, that seems less likely in the future. This adds extra sting to the inclusion of corporate liability protections, described in an article on The Daily Poster by David Sirota and Julia Rock as “a holiday-season gift for corporate donors.” As the article states:

“It would strip frontline workers of their last remaining legal tool to protect themselves in the workplace — at the same time the unemployment system is designed to financially punish those workers if they refuse to return to unsafe workplaces during the pandemic. The legislation comes not only as workers continue to die, but also as roughly 7 to 9 percent of the total COVID death count are ‘take home’ infections traced to employees unwittingly spreading the disease to their families and friends.”

As much as some would like to think that the Republicans are the only ones favoring corporations over the working class, the effort is truly bipartisan. As the Sirota/Rock article reminds us, it was Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo’s liability shield for nursing homes that inspired the current legislation, which was copied “word-for-word” from Cuomo’s previous work. They also warn that this is likely to become a permanent fixture, as Mitt Romney recently praised the measure as “giving states enough time to put in place their own protections.”

Although Pelosi isn’t the only one to blame here, she is the one snapping that “We feed them” when asked about the failure of Congress to get another stimulus bill passed. That exchange with Wolf Blitzer exposes an elitist attitude that helps to explain her evident lack of caring for the plight of U.S. citizens, backed up by the way she repeatedly told Kara Swisher during her interview that “We are legislating,” and her aggressive response to the reporter in her recent press conference upon receiving some small pushback. Apparently, just like Trump, she doesn’t think the peasants should question her decisions.

She also said something else troubling during that press conference: “I’m not doing any more bills that are not bipartisan.” This proposal, and everything leading up to it, is a perfect example of the problem with the kinds of things that are considered bipartisan compromises in Washington. Somehow, the people always end up getting the worst part of the deal.