A senior Senate Republican supports President Trump’s call to Congress to fatten on American coronavirus stimulus controls, calling it a “reasonable demand.”
“I hope Congress is listening,” Senator Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) tweeted Friday night, after spending part of Christmas with the president at Trump’s West Palm Beach, Florida golf club.
“I am convinced he is more determined than ever to increase incentive payments to $ 2,000 per person,” Graham added.
Trump has been pressuring Republicans this week over his last-minute rejection of the $ 900 billion aid package approved by Congress Monday after months of delay.
His strong criticism of the $ 600 relief checks that Americans would receive under the plan caused a stir in lawmakers when he left the measure, including with a government-appropriated bill of 1.4 trillions of dollars, unsigned.
The House will have to vote for independent legislation that will increase stimulus controls to $ 2,000, but several Senate Republicans have shown resistance to the idea.
“It took us a long time to get where we are,” Senator Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) Said Thursday. “I think reopening this bill would be a mistake.”
But Trump has continued to push, slapping again “the miserable $ 600 that’s now on the bill” in a Saturday’s tweet.
Georgia Sen. Kelly Loeffler, who is locked in a tight Jan. 5 race, said Wednesday she would also consider Trump’s demand for a larger stimulus “if it rests on a useless expense.”