众议院议长南希·佩洛西和财政部长史蒂文·姆努钦周一下午通了电话，试图就一项冠状病毒在佩洛西第一次设定了一个星期二的最后期限，如果额外的援助被批准的话选举日之前。
在美国广播公司“本周”周日的新闻发布会上佩洛西把球踢给了政府，告诉美国广播公司首席新闻主播乔治·斯特凡诺普洛斯，“我们还没有在语言上达成一致，但我有希望，”指的是关于国家病毒测试计划的悬而未决的问题——民主党人一直坚持这一点。她说:“我很乐观，因为我们在所有这些问题上又来来回回了。”。
“我们对他们说，我们必须冻结其中一些东西的设计——我们到底要不要这样做——以及语言是什么，”没有见过总统的佩洛西补充道唐纳德·特朗普但是他说这样做没有什么意义。
亚历山大·德拉戈/路透社，文件
众议院议长南希·佩洛西在华盛顿国会山的新闻发布会上发言，2020年9月18日。
佩洛西的副参谋长德鲁·哈米尔在推特上说，在佩洛西和姆努钦周一的讨论中，取得了渐进的进展。根据这条推特，佩洛西已经要求委员会主席调和与共和党对手的分歧。
“议长继续希望，到周二结束时，我们将清楚我们是否能够在选举前通过一项法案，”哈米尔说。两位将于周二再次发言。
特朗普在自己周末接受威斯康辛州一家电视台采访时，试图超越佩洛西，称他愿意比她提议的更高，尽管他自己的政党缺乏支持。
“我会比她的数字高，谁知道她的数字是多少，但是如果你说一万亿——八万亿，两万亿，如果你说两万亿——二万亿，那么多数字——我愿意比那个高，因为这不是人民的错，”特朗普告诉密尔沃基WTMJ电视台的查尔斯·本森。
佩洛西新的48小时最后期限——就在选举日的两周前——白宫对此反应不一。尽管白宫通信主任阿里萨·法拉在福克斯新闻采访中称佩洛西的时间表是“人为的”，但白宫办公厅主任马克·梅多斯对此表示欢迎。
“48小时的最后期限当然受到我们的欢迎，”梅多斯周一上午告诉记者，尽管这位前保守党国会议员表示，这位议长“在谈判中仍然非常僵硬”。佩洛西此前在新冠肺炎会谈中的角色已经被立即解除。你知道，这是她的方式或高速公路;要么全有，要么全无。”
艾琳·斯科特/路透社
2020年9月30日，财政部长史蒂夫·姆努钦走过华盛顿的美国国会大厦。
梅多斯说，他和Mnuchin“在过去几天里进行了多次非常富有成效的讨论，这给了我们一个希望，即我们可能能够在未来48小时内达成某种协议。”
梅多斯说:“我可以告诉你，总统要求我们参与进来，如果她愿意就她提出的一些极端政策倡议开展工作，并在这些问题上开展工作的话。”。
共和党人和白宫拒绝了对管理不善的州养老基金的数千亿美元援助，许多人(如果他们支持任何进一步的刺激措施的话)拒绝了任何价格超过1万亿美元的一揽子计划，这使他们与总统明显不和。
佩洛西和Mnuchin已经谈判了几个月，以达成另一项冠状病毒缓解方案的协议。民主党领导的众议院在5月份通过了一项3万亿美元的措施，共和党人拒绝在参议院考虑，最近白宫提出了一项1.8万亿美元的妥协，参议院多数党领袖米奇·麦康奈尔对此嗤之以鼻。
尽管麦康奈尔周日表示，参议院将“考虑”佩洛西-姆努钦(Pelosi-Mnuchin)谈判达成的任何妥协，但就在几天前，这位共和党领导人立即拒绝了这一努力，并指出，他所在的共和党会议的大部分成员也将采取这一立场。
约书亚·罗伯茨/路透社
2020年9月30日，国会山，参议员多数党领袖米奇·麦康奈尔(R-KY)在与共和党参议员共进午餐后对媒体发表讲话。
当被问及是否会在2万亿美元的价格范围内达成妥协时，麦康奈尔说，“我不这么认为，因为我的成员——这是政府愿意去的地方——我的成员认为我们提出的半万亿美元、高度有针对性的方案是最好的办法。这就是我要放在地板上的东西。这是参议院共和党人...“我觉得这是一个恰当的回应，”他补充道，“财政部长和议长之间正在讨论一个更高的数额。呃——那不是我要放在地板上的。”
第二位参议院共和党人、南达科他州的参议员约翰·图恩(John Thune)表示，佩洛西和姆努钦之间的协议需要在众议院获得足够的共和党参议员支持才能获得通过。
“如果他们同意一些他们必须在众议院以所有民主党人的选票通过的事情，我的猜测是，领导人将希望看到一些证据，表明无论达成什么协议，都有共和党的支持，以试图说服这里的共和党人支持它，”图恩说。“当他们的自然本能取决于它有多大和里面有什么可能会反对它。”
在麦康奈尔藐视特朗普的罕见例子中，他表示，他将召集民主党上个月否决的同样的5000亿美元精简的共和党冠状病毒救助法案，为周三进行投票。
共和党法案包含1000多亿美元用于教育需求，数十亿美元用于冠状病毒疫苗、病毒测试和跟踪，补充受欢迎的小企业贷款计划，失业援助和诉讼保护。
周二，参议院还将对一项独立的救助法案进行表决，该法案旨在补充第一轮大流行救助中创建的薪资保障计划。
麦康奈尔说，投票将是一个让民主党人记录在案的机会。
“这种情况已经持续了几个月。全有或全无阻碍。它必须停止，”麦康奈尔，R-Ky。，舒克说。“议长的玛丽·安蒂奥内特法案需要结束。对工薪家庭来说，零美元，但对众议院议长来说，大量的电视时间对美国人民来说不是一个好交易。
少数党领袖查克·舒默(Chuck Schumer)已经表示，这两项努力不会通过，他周一辩称，麦康奈尔“设计它是为了失败”，这是“显而易见的”。
舒默说:“这不是一次严重的流行病缓解尝试，而是在选举前给共和党人政治掩护的又一次尝试。”
民主党人呼吁根据众议院通过的内容，制定一个更加全面的一揽子计划，包括对遭受重创的州和地方政府的援助，对美国个人的另一轮1200美元刺激计划，以及对失业美国人的更多援助，食品安全，儿童保健和医疗保健。
众议院和参议院议员之间的冲突——更不用说佩洛西和特朗普政府之间的冲突了——意味着在选举日之前不可能达成任何协议，这一点已经明显存在了几周，但很少有人愿意在可能颠覆白宫甚至参议院的选举之前大声说出来。
A Tuesday deadline for pandemic relief deal but prospects dim
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin spoke by phone Monday afternoon to try to reach a compromise on acoronavirusrelief deal, after Pelosi - for the first time - set a Tuesday deadline if additional aid is to be approvedbefore Election Day.
Pressed on ABC's "This Week" Sunday, Pelosi put the ball in the administration’s court, telling ABC News Chief Anchor George Stephanopoulos, "We don't have agreement in the language yet, but I'm hopeful,” referring to outstanding issues regarding a national virus testing plan - something on which Democrats have insisted. "I'm optimistic because, again, we’ve been back and forth on all of this," she said.
“We’re saying to them we have to freeze the design on some of these things - are we going with it or not - and what is the language,” added Pelosi who has not met with PresidentDonald Trumpfor more than a year but says there’s little point to doing so.
Pelosi's deputy chief of staff, Drew Hammill, tweeted that incremental progress was made during Pelosi and Mnuchin's discussion Monday. Pelosi has tasked committee chairs to reconcile differences with their GOP counterparts, according to the tweet.
"The Speaker continues to hope that, by the end of the day Tuesday, we will have clarity on whether we will be able to pass a bill before the election," Hammill said. The two will speak again Tuesday.
In his own weekend interview with a Wisconsin television station, Trump sought to one-up Pelosi, saying he is willing to go higher than what she was proposing, despite lacking support among those in his own party.
“I'd go higher than her number, who knows what her number is, but if you said a trillion-eight, two trillion, if you said two trillion-two, so many numbers - I'm willing to go higher than that, because it wasn't the people's fault,” Trump told Charles Benson of Milwaukee station WTMJ.
Pelosi's new 48-hour deadline - just two weeks before Election Day - was met with mixed reaction by the White House. Even as White House Communications Director Alyssa Farah - in a Fox News interview - called Pelosi’s timeline “artificial,” White House chief of staff Mark Meadows welcomed it.
“The 48-hour deadline is certainly welcomed by us,” Meadows told reporters Monday morning, though the former conservative congressman, whose prior role in COVID-19 talks Pelosi has dismissed out of hand, said the speaker “continues to be very rigid in her negotiation. You know, it's her way or the highway; it's all or nothing.”
Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin walks though the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Sept. 30, 2020.
Meadows said he and Mnuchin “had a number of very fruitful discussions over the last several days that give us a hope that we may be able to reach some kind of an agreement in the next 48 hours.”
"I can tell you the president has asked us to engage, if she's willing to work in terms of some of the extreme policy initiatives that she's put forth and work on those issues,” Meadows said.
Republicans and the White House have rejected hundreds of billions in aid to states that have poorly managed state pension funds, and many - if they support any further stimulus at all - have dismissed any package with a price tag in excess of $1 trillion, putting them distinctly at odds with the president.
Pelosi and Mnuchin have been negotiating for months to reach a deal on another coronavirus relief package. The Democratic-led House passed a $3 trillion measure in May that Republicans refused to consider in the Senate, and recently the White House offered a $1.8 trillion compromise at which Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell scoffed.
And though McConnell said on Sunday that the Senate would “consider” any Pelosi-Mnuchin negotiated compromise, the GOP leader just days earlier rejected that effort out of hand and noted that most of his GOP conference would take that position, too.
Sen. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) speaks to the media after a lunch with Republican Senators, on Capitol Hill, Sept. 30, 2020.
Asked if a compromise was to be had around the $2 trillion price range, McConnell said, “I don’t think so, because my members - that’s where the administration is willing to go - my members think what we laid out a half trillion dollars, highly targeted is the best way to go. And so that’s what I’m gonna put on the floor. It’s what Senate Republicans ... feel like is an appropriate response,” adding, “There are discussions going on between the secretary of the Treasury and the speaker about a higher amount. Uh -- that’s not what I’m gonna put on the floor.”
The second-ranking Senate Republican, Sen. John Thune of South Dakota, said an agreement between Pelosi and Mnuchin would need to pass the House with enough Republican support for GOP senators to get behind it.
"If they agree to something they have to pass in the House with all Democratic votes my guess is the Leader is going to want to see some evidence that whatever is agreed upon has Republican support to try to convince Republicans over here to be for it," Thune said. "When their natural instinct depending on how big it is and what's in it is probably going to be to be against it."
In a rare instance of McConnell defying Trump, he said he would, instead, call up the same $500 billion slimmed-down GOP coronavirus relief bill that Democrats rejected last month, setting up a vote for Wednesday.
The GOP bill contains more than $100 billion for education needs, billions for a coronavirus vaccine, virus testing and tracing, a replenishment of the popular small business loan program, unemployment assistance, and a litigation shield.
On Tuesday, the Senate will also vote on a standalone relief bill aimed at replenishing the Paycheck Protection Program created in the first round of pandemic relief.
The votes will be, McConnell said, an opportunity to put Democrats on the record.
"This has been the position for months. All or nothing obstruction. It's got to stop," McConnell, R-Ky., said Monday. "The Speaker's Marie Antionette act needs to end. Zero dollars for working families but a whole lot of television time for the speaker of the house is not a good trade for the American people.
Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has already signaled that these two efforts will not pass, arguing Monday that it is "obvious" that McConnell "designed it to fail".
"This is not a serious attempt at pandemic relief it seems to be another attempt at giving Republicans political cover before the election," Schumer said.
Democrats are calling for a far more sweeping package in line with what has passed the House to include aid for hard-hit state and local governments, another round of $1200 stimulus checks fo individual Americans, and greater amounts for jobless Americans, food security, child care, and health care.
The clash between House and Senate lawmakers - not to mention between Pelosi and the Trump administration - meant that no deal was likely ahead of Election Day, something that has been apparent for weeks but few have been willing to say out loud ahead of an election that could flip the White House and possibly even the Senate.
