{"id":1486,"date":"2020-12-08T20:37:54","date_gmt":"2020-12-08T20:37:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.radiofree.org\/?p=135714"},"modified":"2020-12-08T20:37:54","modified_gmt":"2020-12-08T20:37:54","slug":"sanders-gillibrand-warren-merkley-markey-and-wyden-urge-colleagues-to-defend-working-class-in-covid-19-relief-proposal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2020\/12\/08\/sanders-gillibrand-warren-merkley-markey-and-wyden-urge-colleagues-to-defend-working-class-in-covid-19-relief-proposal\/","title":{"rendered":"Sanders, Gillibrand, Warren, Merkley, Markey and Wyden Urge Colleagues to Defend Working Class in COVID-19 Relief Proposal"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n

WASHINGTON – Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) urged Senate Democrats today to recognize the enormity of the economic and public-health crisis posed by COVID-19 and join them \u201cin demanding that any new COVID-19 relief proposal includes a $1,200 direct payment to adults and $500 to their children,\u201d while rejecting provisions \u201cto give a liability shield to corporations who threaten the health and safety of workers and customers.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a letter<\/a> to their colleagues, the Senators note that COVID-19 is infecting nearly 200,000 Americans and killing 2,000 Americans daily, and argue that a bipartisan proposal under negotiation \u201cdoes not go anywhere near far enough,\u201d as America experiences \u201cthe worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.\u201d Only $348 billion in new money is currently allocated in that proposal, the Senators point out, even though \u201cthe Trump Administration and a bipartisan coalition in the House supported over $1.8 trillion in COVID-19 relief that also included another $1,200 direct payment.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt would be unacceptable to take a major step backwards from those previous efforts by passing legislation that only included $348 billion in new money,\u201d the Senators wrote to their Democratic colleagues.<\/p>\n

The lawmakers further expressed their opposition to \u201ca get-out-of-jail free card to companies that put the lives of their workers and customers at risk\u201d currently under consideration in a bipartisan COVID-19 relief measure, and cited concerns from labor groups that \u201cgranting immunity would make the country less safe at the exact moment when the COVID-19 pandemic is entering a new, dangerous phase.\u201d<\/p>\n

The letter\u2019s signatories also registered their agreement \u201cwith President-elect Biden that a $1,200 direct payment should be included in this proposal,\u201d as over half of American workers live paycheck to paycheck and one in four are either unemployed or make less than $20,000 a year, while millions more face eviction and hunger.<\/p>\n

Read the letter here<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n

This post was originally published on Radio Free<\/a>. <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WASHINGTON \u2013 Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.),\u00a0Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.),\u00a0Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.)\u00a0urged Senate Democrats today to recognize the enormity of\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1486"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1486"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1486\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1487,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1486\/revisions\/1487"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1486"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1486"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1486"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}