President Trump said, ‘You work on the payments to the people’ as he left the White House.
Photo: Alex Brandon/Associated PressWASHINGTON—Democrats rejected a last-minute push from President Trump to pass a short-term coronavirus relief bill as bipartisan talks faltered ahead of the expiration of enhanced jobless benefits this week.
In remarks Wednesday morning, Mr. Trump and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said that if agreement between Democrats and Republicans can’t be reached by Friday, then a stopgap measure should be approved on unemployment payments and evictions while broader negotiations continue.
But that campaign was short lived, with White House chief of staff Mark Meadows concluding after a meeting with top Democrats on Wednesday that neither a narrow, temporary deal or a broader, long-term agreement was near.
“We’re nowhere close to a deal,” Mr. Meadows said. “Enhanced unemployment provisions will expire.”
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) had rejected previous White House calls for a stopgap measure in the negotiations, insisting instead an overall agreement on a package. Democrats have largely rallied behind their $3.5 trillion bill that passed the House in May.
“We don’t know why Republicans come around here with a skinny bill that does nothing to address really what’s happening with the virus and has a little of this and a little of that. We’re not accepting that. We have to have a comprehensive, full bill,” Mrs. Pelosi said Wednesday.
With a $600 weekly federal unemployment benefit set to officially expire on Friday, Senate Republicans were split on the idea of pursuing a short-term deal, with some favoring a comprehensive agreement and others open to crafting a measure more narrow than the $1 trillion proposal the party released two days ago.
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“I think it’s gonna be difficult in the short term to get agreement on a larger package, and people need help,” said Sen. John Kennedy (R., La.).
Mr. Trump said a short-term deal should focus on keeping people in their homes.
“You ought to work on the evictions, so people don’t get evicted. You work on the payments to the people,” Mr. Trump told reporters as he left the White House for a trip to Texas. “The rest of it we’re so far apart we don’t care. We really don’t care. We want to take care of the people.”
Almost a third of the country’s renters had been protected by a current eviction moratorium that covered properties with federally insured mortgages. That expired July 25. Democrats proposed expanding and extending the moratorium, while Republicans didn’t include extending the eviction moratorium in their plan. The White House declined to comment further on what Mr. Trump was seeking.
Mr. Mnuchin and White House chief of staff Mark Meadows held a pair of meetings with Senate Republicans on Wednesday, and many GOP lawmakers said they still wanted to address all of the party’s proposals at once. Republicans have struggled to overcome internal differences on the size and scope of the next bill.
“I’d rather do the whole thing. I’d rather use the deadline to get it done,” said Sen. Rob Portman (R., Ohio).
For weeks this spring and summer, Senate Republicans delayed action on a fifth coronavirus bill, wanting to see how earlier rounds of aid worked out and hoping that the economic and health landscape would improve. But it also limited their time to maneuver, with unemployment assistance expiring in just days and lawmakers scheduled to go on recess after the end of next week.
“If people believe there’s potential there and there’s optimism we could actually get to a package by the end of next week, then my guess is everybody will put their pencils to work and see if we can hammer it out,” said Sen. John Thune (R., S.D.), the No. 2 Senate Republican. “But if it doesn’t look like that by the end of the week, then I think we’ll have to go to plan B,” he said.
With Mrs. Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) also meeting with Messrs. Mnuchin and Meadows Wednesday, battle lines were hardening over unemployment assistance and liability protections.
Republicans have put forward a proposal that would give federal courts jurisdiction in cases arising from people possibly exposed to coronavirus at businesses, schools and health-care facilities. The Republican plan would require plaintiffs to prove gross negligence or willful misconduct in the suits, setting a higher bar for the litigants.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) has said for months that expanded liability protections are a necessity for businesses, schools and health-care providers to operate without a constant fear of lawsuits.
“There is no chance, zero chance, America can get to normal without the…liability protection. And no bill will be put on the Senate floor that does not include it,” Mr. McConnell said.
Democrats criticized Mr. McConnell’s emphasis on the liability measure, arguing that setting absolutes in the talks could tank a deal.
“It seems to me that Sen. McConnell really doesn’t want to get an agreement made, by the announcement he made about nothing coming to the floor until it’s completely his way on liability. It wasn’t a good way for us to start the discussion this afternoon,” Mrs. Pelosi said Tuesday.
Mr. McConnell shot back on Wednesday morning that Democratic efforts to continue a $600 supplement to state unemployment benefits through January was similarly a nonstarter. The Republican plan cuts the current federal $600 weekly unemployment supplement to $200 a week through September, when the payment will then combine with state benefits to replace 70% of previous wages through the end of this year.
“That’s apparently the speaker’s position. That we will not let a package go forward unless we continue paying people more not to work,” Mr. McConnell said. “That is a completely unhinged position,” he said.
A University of Chicago study found that 68% of workers are receiving more in unemployment benefits than they did from working, though some economists have found that hasn’t slowed people from returning to work.
Mr. Mnuchin said Wednesday evening that he thought bipartisan support for employee retention tax credits, education funding and small-business aid will make those topics easier to address.
“Obviously there are other areas that we’re very far apart on,” he said.
In his comments Wednesday, Mr. Trump also defended the inclusion in the Republican bill of the White House’s request for $1.75 billion for a new FBI building built at its current site in Washington, D.C.
“It’s the best piece of property in Washington,” Mr. Trump said. Asked about pushback from some GOP lawmakers who signaled they don’t want the money in the coronavirus package, the president replied, “Then Republicans should go back to school and learn. We need a new building. It’s a bad building, it’s a dangerous building.”
The administration abruptly canceled plans in 2017 to build a suburban Federal Bureau of Investigation campus and instead pushed to keep the agency’s current downtown location, saying officials wanted it to remain across the street from the main Justice Department building. Keeping the FBI downtown would also prevent the redevelopment of the site, which is near the Trump International Hotel.
—Alex Leary contributed to this article.
Write to Andrew Duehren at andrew.duehren@wsj.com
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