President Biden is on the precipice of the biggest legislative win so far in his time in office: the signing of a $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief package the House is expected to approve Wednesday.
The package is highlighted by the $1,400 direct payments to be sent to millions of households, an extension of unemployment benefits and funding for vaccine distribution.
But it includes much more than those provisions. Here’s a look at what else is in the bill. Continue reading.
SAINT PAUL, MINNESOTA – Today, President Joe Biden signed the American Rescue Plan, his $1.9 trillion COVID relief and stimulus bill, into law. The wide-ranging and incredibly popular bill contains numerous important measures to combatting COVID-19 and helping the American people build back better from the pandemic, including:
Every DFL member of Congress voted in favor of the American Rescue Plan and every Minnesota Republican voted against it. Republican opposition comes despite the bill’s tremendous popularity among voters across the political spectrum – 75% of American voters and 59% of Republican voters approve of the American Rescue Plan – and despite the roughly $1 billion in local government aid the bill will bring to Minnesota’s Republican-controlled congressional districts.
Continue reading “DFL Party Statement on President Biden Signing the American Rescue Plan Into Law”
Ramsey officials said order infringes on individuals’ constitutional rights.
The city of Ramsey has voted to stop enforcing Gov. Tim Walz’s mask mandate, arguing that the statewide effort to prevent the spread of COVID-19 is infringing on individuals’ constitutional rights.
In 4-3 vote Tuesday night, the City Council approved the measure put forth by council members Ryan Heineman and Chelsee Howell stating that city resources “physical, financial or otherwise shall not be used to enforce any of Gov. Walz’s Emergency Executive Orders.”
It was not immediately clear what liability the city might face as a result of the vote, which was discouraged by city attorney Joe Langel. Continue reading.
Ron DeSantis, the Trump-loving governor of Florida, is getting into more hot water over claims that his office steered vaccines toward wealthy communities filled with Republican donors.
The Tampa Bay Times reports that leaked text messages between donors and public officials indicate that DeSantis’s office was involved with directing which areas got special access to vaccines, despite the governor’s denials of favoritism.
At issue is the method by which officials in Manatee County had initially set up vaccination eligibility versus the way that vaccination eligibility was actually determined. Continue reading.
In an interview with the Idaho Statesman’s Audrey Dutton, 63-year-old long-haul trucker Paul Russell admitted his career is over because he didn’t take the COVID-19 pandemic seriously, believing it would simply disappear after the November election.
After contracting the virus and nearly dying, he now admits he was a “jackass” who will have to spend the rest of his life on oxygen due to the damage inflicted on his body by the novel coronavirus.
According to Russell, he wasn’t taking precautions on a trip from Florida back to Boise — with a stop in Houston — when he thinks he was infected and felt ill before he got home. Continue reading.
New Year’s Eve 2019: Ian Lipkin, a famed Columbia University epidemiologist, is having dinner with his wife and a fellow scientist. He gets a confidential phone call from a highly placed source in China: There’s a cluster of pneumonia-like illnesses in the city of Wuhan caused by a novel coronavirus. The source says it’s not that big a deal: It doesn’t look very transmissible.
“I was told not to worry about it,” Lipkin recalls.
It was something to worry about. Continue reading.
The House voted 220-211 on Wednesday to approve the Senate’s revised version of President Biden’s $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package, sending the bill to Biden’s desk to be signed.
Why it matters: The passage of the “American Rescue Plan” is the first — and potentially defining — legislative victory of Biden’s presidency, marking a key milestone in his pledge to steer the U.S. out of the coronavirus crisis.
The big picture: The package is being touted by Democrats as one of the most consequential anti-poverty bills of the modern era, with the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center projecting that it will boost incomes for the poorest 20% of Americans by 20%. Continue reading.
WASHINGTON – The Biden administration said Monday it is taking steps to combat Russian disinformation aimed at undermining confidence in the COVID-19 vaccines produced by Pfizer Inc. and other Western companies.
“We will fight (the disinformation) with every tool we have,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said during a press briefing on Monday.
On Sunday, the Wall Street Journal reported that four publications, all serving as fronts for Russian intelligence, have targeted Western-produced COVID-19 vaccines with misleading coverage that exaggerates the risk of side effects and raises questions about their efficacy. Continue reading.
Almost one-third of Republicans tell pollsters they ‘definitely won’t’ get vaccinated.
Margaret, an 80-year-old retiree who lives outside Tulsa, has spent the past year living in fear of the coronavirus. She’s constantly worn masks, toted hand sanitizer and used drive-throughs to run her errands. Her age and preexisting health conditions — including heart failure, diabetes and blood clots — put her at elevated risk if she gets sick.
But unlike many at-risk Americans seeking safety and an end to the pandemic, Margaret refuses to get a coronavirus vaccine.
“There’s too many unanswered questions,” said Margaret, who agreed to be interviewed only if her last name was withheld because of concerns she might be harassed. Margaret also said she’s fearful of possible side effects, like the headaches that some people have gotten from the second shot. “I’d just as soon as not go through that,” she said. Continue reading.
New federal guidelines released Monday saying it is safe for fully vaccinated people to gather indoors with each other without masks is adding hope that a return to normality — or something close to it — might be getting closer as the nation hits one year in a locked-down state.
No one knows exactly when it will be normal again — if ever, given how the coronavirus pandemic has elevated concerns about contagious diseases in general.
There’s also quite a bit of uncertainty going forward, especially as variants of the virus continue to circulate. Continue reading.
