Democratic leaders on Wednesday morning released a statement calling for an interim emergency COVID-19 relief legislation. The statement calls for a new COVID-19 relief package to include:
"Congressional Democrats are calling for:
The interim emergency legislation is expected to move quickly and could pass Congress as early as this week.
"Congressional Democrats are calling for:
- $250 billion in assistance to small businesses, with $125 billion channeled through community-based financial institutions that serve farmers, family, women, minority and veteran-owned small businesses and nonprofits in rural, tribal, suburban and urban communities across our country, and improvements to ensure all eligible small businesses can access this critical funding and are not turned away by banks;
- $100 billion for hospitals, community health centers and health systems, providing desperately needed resources to the frontlines of this crisis, including production and distribution of national rapid testing and Personal Protective Equipment (PPE);
- $150 billion for state and local governments to manage this crisis and mitigate lost revenue, doubling down on the investment secured in the CARES Act;
- Strong additional support for families with a 15 percent increase to the maximum SNAP benefit to help put food on the table."
The interim emergency legislation is expected to move quickly and could pass Congress as early as this week.
