Senate

GOP senator: Administration officials showing ‘they don’t care if they have to work with us’

Greg Nash

Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) said on Sunday that Biden administration officials are showing they don’t want to work with Republicans on a coronavirus economic stimulus bill. 

“I am absolutely willing to work with anyone if it is good for the American people because that’s what we should all be about. We have conservative solutions. The more conservative values infuse public policy, I think, the better public policy is. On the other hand, the administration is showing very clearly they don’t care if they have to work with us,” Cassidy said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet The Press.”

“They’re willing to push things through even if someone like Larry Summers, a former Democratic Treasury secretary, says it’s boneheaded policy. I’m paraphrasing,” he added, referring to President Biden’s $1.9 trillion relief package. “And even if we come in good faith with at least 10 and more that would have joined us, and they say they don’t care. So, you got that — it takes two to tango. Right now, I’m not sure we have the two to tango.”

The White House is in the midst of ongoing negotiations with congressional Republicans about the size and scope of the relief package. During a recent meeting, Biden told a group of 10 GOP senators that a $618 billion package is too small and does not go far enough in helping Americans affected by the pandemic. 

There is broad bipartisan support for the next round of coronavirus stimulus checks to be more targeted to individuals who need the funds most, The Hill reported last week.

Senate Democrats on Friday approved a budget resolution that will allow them to push ahead with a relief package without GOP support. 

“First, let’s say that we all made it clear that we’re willing to negotiate. That wasn’t our endpoint. It was where we felt that, if you put things together, added them up, it was a sum which met the American people’s needs,” Cassidy said on Sunday.

“And why could President Biden believe it? He could believe it because when there was a Republican president and Republicans controlled the Senate, we passed five different COVID relief packages on a bipartisan basis with overwhelming margins. We had shown that we would negotiate and come to answers. He should also do it because maybe it happens to be the right policy,” he added. 

Tags Bill Cassidy Federal government of the United States Joe Biden

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