Thread by @BBuchman_CNS

Today: The Senate is back in session @ 3PM ET, not long after we will see a vote for debate to start on the NDAA veto override. A Senate bill bunching $2k checks/Trump's election fraud cmte/Section 230 repeal also expected there PLUS the House's CASH Act (clean $2k checks bill)

Timing on action for the Senate combo legislation or the already passed House bill still TBA.
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You know the drill by now, I take it - @JackRodgersCNS and I will have the coverage for you!

Just two days left this year and the Senate is back in session. The prayer today starts with a request for "contemplative stillness" that makes lawmakers yearn for "righteousness, justice and peace."

Time will have to tell on that one.

Mitch McConnell says the Senate was supposed to finish legislating on NDAA but the "junior senator from Vermont had other ideas," @senatemajldr says, cutting right into Bernie Sanders, who has vowed to object to funding $740B defense bill w/o passage of $2k checks
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The majority leader says Trump's desire to see $2k checks has no realistic path in the Senate.
On NDAA, Mitch says: "We'll stay on this important bill until we complete it, one way or another."
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McConnell is giving glory to Trump on legislation that has passed already for pandemic relief - the $600 checks approved earlier this month.

McConnell: On expanding non-targeted direct payment, the Senate committed to beginning one process to combine three of Trump's priorities: larger checks, repeal of Section 230 and further efforts to review the integrity of the "democracy."

Now, McConnell says, Trump and House and Sen. Dems want something entirely different.

McConnell says Dems are trying to "warp what President Trump actually laid out."

McConnell: "It's hardly clear that the federal government should be sending funding to six-figure income Americans who have been teleworking all year."

He wants targeted relief.

McConnell says if people who need help - even after the "huge" stimulus just passed - that $600 - then, essentially, it'll be left to negotiations later, potentially.

The Senate is not going to split apart three issues Trump wants because Democrats are afraid of two of them, McConnell says.

The Senate won't be bogged down to help rich Democrats.
"We're gonna stay smart, we're gonna stay focused and we're going to continue delivering on the needs for our nation," the majority leader says.

After McConnell comes out and says, to America, no checks for you, unless Democrats give us what Trump is demanding wholly unrelated to Covid or NDAA - Schumer is now addressing Senator Hawley's announcement today to object to election results.

Now, back to this business, Schumer says "Today Senate will begin the process of overriding the veto on NDAA - the House has already done that."

This is going to be a long afternoon.

Background:
courthousenews.com/house-votes-to…

The president vetoed a pay raise to living American soldiers in order to defend the honor of dead Confederate traitors, @SenSchumer says from the Senate floor.

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McConnell should bring both NDAA veto override and $2k checks up separately, on an up/down vote, Schumer says.
He is asking for a time tonight for a vote on the House-passed bill authorizing $2k.
McConnell rejected this offer from Schumer yesterday.

"There is no other game in town besides the House bill, the only way to get to the American people $2k checks they deserve and need is to pass the House bill and pass it now.
The House is recessed for the year, any modification cannot become law before the end of this Congress."

Schumer salutes @BernieSanders for championing the $2k checks.

Not literally salute - to be clear, you jokers.

:)

After all of Trump's attacks on the country, is this where Senate R's are going to draw the line? Schumer needles McConnell. "$2,000 checks to the American people? That is a bridge too far? Please."

We can have this vote tonight and send it to Trump's desk for signature, Schumer said.
(Trump wants it, after all.)
Vote on NDAA tonight and finish Senate business. All it takes is for Senate to consent to vote on House bill. Yes or no. Up or down, he pleads.

Schumer: Do you support sending $2k to American people or not? Let's have the vote.

McConnell objects without missing a breath.
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.@BernieSanders on the floor - notes that some of the poorest counties in the nation are in Kentucky, @senatemajldr's home state. Bernie says McConnell might want to talk to working families in KY and see how they feel about needing immediate help.
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I have a strong feeling the ppl of Kentucky will respond no differently than the people of VT or NY, Sanders remarks.

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All we are asking is to allow members of the United States Senate to cast a vote. If you want to vote against giving constituents $2,000, vote against it. All we are asking for is a vote. What is the problem? - @BernieSanders

We have a very unlikely ally, Bernie notes: President Trump. Nobody disagrees with him more times than I have, he adds, "but this is what the leader of the GOP is saying - $2,000 ASAP"

All Senators need is 60 votes to win the $2k.

With that, Sanders asks unanimous consent that at 11:30am on Dec 31 the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of the CASH Act. ($2k) That it be read and passed without debate and if passed, no motions to reconsider.

Sen. Pat Toomey, R-PA, objects to this.

Toomey was incredulous at suggestion that more stimulus would be sent to Americans because, in his estimation, it will go largely to Americans who have "no lost income"

So, the argument is - those of you who lost income, but aren't wealthy - too bad for now.

.@SenMarkey : People are literally starving, cold and without homes. Meanwhile, the Republican leadership would rather head home for the New Year and ignore the health and financial crises taking the toll on millions of Americans.

Markey: The GOP worried the $2k would bloat our budgets.
"Where was this outrage when they blew up our national deficit to give a $1.5T in tax cuts to billionaires?"
"These are the crocodile tears of the right, while America sheds real tears," he says.
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Americans are tired of being let down "repeatedly as Trump and their Republican allies have abandoned them," Markey says.

This is the issue - yes or no, up or down, on providing $2K checks to Americans to help them make it through the worst part of this crisis, he adds.

Markey, like Sanders before him, asks if there is an objection or if they can vote.

Senator Bob Cornyn, R-TX, objects.

"If there's more we need to do, I'm confident we will do it," Cornyn says.

(It took months for them to get to $600 and there are 330k+ dead from Covid-19 and a new strain that is more transmissible has popped up in Colorado)
Background via @Bright_lamp
courthousenews.com/first-known-us…

Sen. Dick Durbin again, reminds the Senate, the House is out of session. It is up to McConnell to decide, right here and now, to get this done and bring it to a vote by 5PM ET.
Let GOP and Dems express their will on behalf of the country, Durbin urges.

Bob Cornyn asks Durbin if he will pair the request for $2k direct payments with a liability shield for business operating under gov't Covid restrictions.
Durbin: I know your passion for immunity for corporations.

Durbin: I don't believe that is consistent with keeping the nation safe during a pandemic and it is not responsive to any onslaught of lawsuits.

The number of med mal cases filed since the pandemic onset is slightly higher than the total number of lawsuits filed by Trump in the Nov. 3 election, Durbin says.

"This is not a tsunami of lawsuits and we can take reasonable measures to support and defend companies that make good faith effort to comply," Durbin says.

Cornyn would go too far on this, the IL Dem adds.

Bernie Sanders lacing into Cornyn.
What is your problem with allowing the Senate to hold a free standing vote?
You want to deal with corporate liability? Fine, we can deal with that, Bernie says.

"All we're talking about right now is: Will people survive economically in the middle of a pandemic?" - @BernieSanders working to get that up/down vote on this bill for $2k direct payments

If you listen carefully to Cornyn, Sanders said, he has a concern about corporate liability. Fine, so vote on it. Bernie will vote against it, Cornyn will vote for it.
But he's saying to him now, no one in the real world wants to deal with corporate liability right now.

What people in the real world know is what $2k would do for them, Sanders said.
In just over 24 hours, nearly 6k people responded to Bernie's office for a request on what 2k would do for them.

It would ensure people get medication, pay their mortgage, pay rent, get life-saving treatment, put food on their table.
You got a concern about corporate liability? Good issue. Let's bring it to the floor, he says.

KEY: An individual with an income of $75k or less qualifies for $2k. A joint return, $2k could be given to them if income is under $150K.
This is a FACT that the GOP has been blatantly lying about on the house of the Senate floor today. Repeatedly.

While McConnell holds this up for Section 230 repeal + Trump's "election integrity" cmte, note: DOJ found no fraud, No fraud detected by US Elec Assistance Commission or DHS's Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency.

Background on that time Barr went against Trump and said there was no fraud in 2020 election: courthousenews.com/barr-calls-cla…

https://twitter.com/JackRodgersCNS/status/1344404339369136130?s=20

Senators are now voting on *whether to debate* the override of Trump's veto of the 2021 defense spending package.

Maybe it bears repeating that all of this talk about who deserves money or not during a health crisis that has killed 330k+ people - - this is the taxpayer money we're talking about. The taxpayer.

If you paid more than $750 in taxes, you are already paying more than President Trump. But right now, duly elected reps, who collect salary on the taxpayer dime struggle to figure out if you should get your money during a crisis that has lasted nearly a year.

If you want to watch a stream of the Senate floor:
c-span.org/video/?507588-…

Senate adjourned for the day. Story to come for @CourthouseNews.

WASHINGTON (CN) — Republicans on Wednesday retained a vice grip over relief for millions of Americans still enduring the 11th month of a pandemic that has killed more than 330,000.
courthousenews.com/senate-set-to-…
via myself & @JackRodgersCNS
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