House progressives are still on board with Biden's COVID-19 relief bill despite Senate amendments

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last updated 9 March 2021

President Biden has said he isn't worried about any progressive opposition to the amended $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief bill, which was passed by the Senate on Saturday and is headed back to the House for a final vote no later than Wednesday morning. It looks like his confidence was not misplaced.

Per The Hill, Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), the leader of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, said Monday that while she isn't entirely pleased with some of the changes, which include no boosted weekly unemployment benefit, a lower income cap on direct payments, and no gradual minimum wage increase, "we take the win." Jayapal explained that the amendments are "relatively minor in the grand scheme of things."

She said she did warn Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) that the bill could face trouble in the House, where Democrats maintain only a slim majority, if it was "weakened" further, but it appears the stopping point was satisfactory and not unexpected. "Ultimately, given the makeup of the Senate, the House is always going to be more progressive than the Senate," she said. "That is actually our job, to make everything as progressive as possible in the House and then when it goes to the Senate to know that there are going to be some changes." Read more at The Hill.

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Tim is a staff writer at The Week and has contributed to Bedford and Bowery and The New York Transatlantic. He is a graduate of Occidental College and NYU's journalism school. Tim enjoys writing about baseball, Europe, and extinct megafauna. He lives in New York City.

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