Speaker pelosi good morning. Morning. Thank you for being here. Its a sad day. I know that many people, as am i, are quite shaken by the fact that we have passed the 50,000 number of people who have died from the coronavirus mark. Over 50,000. The numbers are staggering but each individual case is so heartbreaking. Yesterday on the floor we heard about a 5yearold girl whose mother a police officer, her father, a firpte. 5 years old, died of the coronavirus and then we heard max zones sister is dying. Senator warrens brother is dying. Thats people we know but people we dont know, theyre having the same kind of terrible grief in their family. Our prayers and thoughts are with those who have lost their loved one. Our prayers and thoughts are with those who have been diagnosed. Approaching 900,000 diagnosed and also, what 26 million having lost their jocks. Staggering numbers. Lots of personal and family grief. The conversation thats going on now is if we are to open government how and when. As i had said, it should be sciencebased. Science based. Testing, testing, testing holds the key to opening the door to taking it from home into the economy. Had testing everyone agrees, testing well, not everyone. Scientists agree that testing, Contact Tracing and isolation are the path to opening up our economy. Since this has occurred three times in march and then yesterday, the congress has passed four bills. In a bipartisan way to address the coronavirus crisis. The first one, march 4. We wrote it in february. Brought it to the floor the beginning of march. Testing, testing, testing. Thats what we talked about at that particular time. So a month and a half later, we dont have anywhere near the adequate testing or plans for it that we need. Thats why were so glad we had a provision in yesterdays bill, which ill talk about in a note. Its so really sad, its hard to even explain why we dont have the testing, we dont have the sufficient kits and we dont have the reagents and the rest. So yesterday brought us some hope because we have 25 billion in testing in the bill for and then we have a large amount of money for Small Businesses. Were especially pleased that we re able to set aside 60 billion more Small Businesses, shall we say the underbanked businesses. Small businesses. Mom and pop businesses, women, minorities, veterans. Tribal d rural area and lands, native americans, all who were not first in line, shall we say, in the first round of in. So i just want to say this because i see something that is out there and i just want to give light to it. You saw on the floor yesterday the members getting up there saying, the republicans saying we should have done this two weeks ago. Yes, we agree. And the person who led whoo their debate, the Ranking Member of the ways and means committee, mr. Brady, he said specifically, he said its just so stunning. He said we could have agreed on this bill in 16 minutes, republicans and democrats. It got held up for all sorts of extracurricular stuff. Extracurricular stuff. 100 billion for hospitals and testing. 75 for hospitals, 25 for testing. 120 billion dollars more for Small Businesses. 0 in the set aside, another 60 grants and small loans for the Emergency Industry disaster loans. Used by many in Small Business because its faster to thet them and you have a longer time to pay them out at a low interest rate. That was 50 billion which is leveraged to over 300 billion in loans. 10 billion in grants. We want awayed 15. We got wanted 1r56789 we got 10. Thats in addition to a previous 10. We need enough more but nonetheless, 1230 billion more for Small Business, in addition to the 250. Which we helped create. The p. P. E. We certainly helped support it but we wanted to be sure we were not hardening the disparity to access to credit that exists in our society by spendsing hundreds of billions of dollars in taxpayers money to not have fair access to everyone so when they just say that, extracurricular stuff. Now, that extracurricular stuff was by and large what we proposed on the floor of the senate. Remember the timetable. April 6. No, april 7 secretary mnuchin called me and said i need a quarter of a Million Dollars in 48 hours for the p. P. E. Well, we all support the p. P. E. But lets see the data, how is this working. Ill get back to you. The next day we got back to him with a plan. Democrats in the house and in the senate putting together a plan that had just what were talking about now. A set aside for the smaller, underbanked communal community, the funding for hospital, testing, events. And that when Mitch Mcconnell went to the floor on the 9th. He went to the floor two weeks ago and said this is it. 250. Not one penney 250, 250. He would not hear the objection raised by senators holland and ben kardon of maryland. They objected to the request that he made and offer it would amended version that contained what we passed yesterday and what he passed by unanimous consent on tuesday but for at least one more week they resisted until the beginning of lasts weekend when they agreed to negotiate and here we have a bill that has the set aside a carveout for the smaller businesses, the increase in the loan program and the grant program, 100 billion for hospitals and test testing. Extracurricular stuff to the republicans. Vital. To the life, lively hood and success of the American People. I just want to review that timetable because when i heard mitch on the floor the other day he was saying we have all these things in here that we asked for. No, youve rejected. No, youve rejected. Speaking of mitch, whats gotten into him . Its an indication. The president is asking people to inject lysol into their lungs and mitch is saying that states should go bankrupt. Its a clear, visible within 24 hours of how the republicans reject science and reject governance. If you dont believe in science and you dont believe in governance, thats their approach. And we do not. We only want government that we need but we know that governance has a role and we know that science has a role and without science in our Decision Making were not going to be on a very successful path so what did we do yesterday . We passed the p. P. E. Program, the paycheck protection program. Ent from 250 to 310. 60 as the set aside. We increased the legending with the 350 billion, leveraged to over 300. Moreline like 350 billion in loans and 10 billion loan in grants that has to be paid back. 735 billion in resources to the front lines, including p. P. E. Personal protective equipment and for providers to our hospitals and 25 billion for testing. We were very blees pleased we were able to get language that called for a National Testing strategy. Strategy, imagine that. So to increase capacity and address racial, ethnic and geographic disparents. This is an interim bill. We were not planning on. In we had cares one and we were getting ready for cares two and then along came this bill. So in bill followed path of cares one in one particular way it did not. In cares one we had 150 billion for state and local. We called that our heroes. State and local, they pay the wages and salaries of our Health Care Workers and Public Hospitals and the rest. Police and fire. Emergency services folks. First responders. Our teachers. Our teachers, our teachers. Our transit workers who enable people, the essential workers to get to work. Again, we have to see what it means to our food workers. Whether theyre in Grocery Stores or carry out or chain stores or whatever. They are on the front line. They are visibly and physically exposed to the virus because of wherer in so we have to do something about that and not to do something, in my view, is morally wrong. Its medical limb disastrous and we cant defeat this pandemic if Mitch Mcconnell is letting our Health Heroes get fired and thats whats happening. Theyre getting fired now. Leader schumer mentioned at a press event, some of you maybe were there the other day, that hundreds have been fired from hospitals in new york already. Public hospitals. Unfortunately, were seeing republicans make comments with zero connection to science and facts. Lets put that behind us and go guard in a way that gets the job done for the American People. I mentioned the president and kill lets say, we can the virus by ingesting disinfectant likely sol into the body. Clearly and sadly, this president is not listening to medical experts and i dont know which ones he is listening to, if any. As i said a few days ago last week, i said america must ignore the lies and start to listen to scientists and others, respected professionals in order to protect ourselves and our loved ones. So, again, if you wish, i can go over what were hoping to do in cares two but i do appreciate the fact so many members came back. 3885. That was the vote on the floor for the bill. I am so appreciative of the members, the staffs of the committees. Max zone waters, frank palone. They did a remarkable job of getting this done in this legislation. I especially want to thank all of the maintenance of the capitol, the support staff on the floor. The come Physicians Office and gave useant at arms who her regimentation on how we could come to the floor in a way with as little exposure with each other as possible. On the floor to take the vote, which the republicans insisted upon and we were there. We had 210, 211, i think, democrats, who voted for it. So im very proud that so many people made the effort to come, even though it was pretty clear that it was going to be a pretty big vote. We had four bills, all bipartisan. We hope that the cares two act will be bipartisan as well. I was especially pleased we were able to pass our bill to elect a select committee to address the coronavirus virus, which will be haired by mr. Cly byrne. Yes, maam . To a lesser extent, other Congressional Republicans have been making similar arguments. Have very little appetite for increased spending. How do you plan to balance giving state and local governments the funding that they need while making sure its targeted at not going to answer for fiscal irspobblet of the past . Speaker pelosi oh, no, this is all coronavirus. Thank you for your question. Everything that weve done in these four bills and what we will do are all corrected to coronavirus. Its about addressing the outlays that states and municipalities have made on the coronavirus as well as the revenue lost because they have no cash flow. The same thing with the hospitals. They dont have paying parents who offseptember some of the charitable work that they do so in the hospitals, as with the state and local, directly related to coronavirus outlays, coronavirus revenue lost. But it is indicative of the fact that they dont believe in governance because they dont really see the connection between the transit worker, the Public Health personnel, the police, fire, and all the rest that are so essential to meeting the needs of the American People. But the fact is, its about jobs. The Small Business initiative is about jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs. So this is about jobs. So many people jobs are depend on it. Teachers are being fired. The custodians of our children, grandchildren in my case, far large part of the day. One more question. If it is nonnegotiable for you, will you agree to another release package that doesnt include Speaker Pelosi i dont know how many more bills we will have but i dont intend to negotiate them in this room, thank you. Yes, maam. You talked about some of the president s medical suggests last night but there were also some medical experts who say they were retaliated against because they didnt back up some of the president s medical ideas . Have you spoken to dr. Bright . Nancy speaker floes pelosi i havent spoken to dr. Bright. I respect him no, sirly. The claire of the Health Industry and commerce, her sthragse legislation created the entity that he is the head of or had been until a couple of days ago the head of and the allegation, shall we say, that the administration was encouraging nose with esponsibility to quicken the approval process for, shall we say, friends. Not based on science but on relationships is a devastating charge and so it has been has to be looked into. Congresswoman eschew has said she will be will be will have a hearing on this. Given the backlog and survey weve seen, it looks like there will be a lot of Small Businesses that will be unable to secure funding the next round either. Speaker pelosi heres the thing. It appeared to be a good thing to enable the banks to facilitate the loans. I heard people who should know otherwise on tv just say this morning, well, the banks have to look out for their own blah, blah, blah. No, they dont. Weve looked out for them. These are guaranteed loans by the f. D. A. This is just like an a. T. M. Machine. S. B. A. Puts the money in, the lender takes it out. It isnt any of their money, and, on top of that, the fed has assumed the loans. That is to say, taken them off the books of the banks so it has nothing to do with their capital equirements or anything like that so they are just a facilitator but all of a sudden in some cases it looks like theyve made themselves Decision Makers about relationships that they have and the rest and i think that requires some close scrutiny. Because this shouldnt depend on hat your bank the data we pass is on the first bill had some disappointments. It was basically said first come, first served with the attitude. And some people knew it would never be that others applied and didnt hear back. They know again, this is about protecting jobs and rebsing Small Business is the source of creation. The optimism, the entrepreneurship as the vitality of our economy. However, the jobs, they need customers. You can keep the place open, pay the rent, the utility bills and the staff but if the door is open and nobody is coming in, youre still not getting ahead of the game. Thats why we need the other job piece. One of the other reasons. For the purpts those employees serve in terms of First Responders, Health Care Workers, teachers, etc. Post office. And the rest. It is disappointing that on the first charge, people had some disappointments. Well see how it goes next. Yes, maam . Do you still plan on having the house come back on may 4 and if so, do you expect to have the next at that time. Speaker pelosi any decision on when to come backrests with the sergeant at arms and the capitol physician. Hopefully things will get started but we will be ready with our next bill and the sooner we canning pass it the better because our teamers, firefighters, First Responders and the rest need the resources that the state and local will bring. How much do you see is necessary to includes in the next package for state and local . Speaker pelosi probably the equivalent to what weve done for Small Businesses but i dont know. Were asking them for their evaluation on what is the needs or the capacity. What can you spend and the rest money t of the fun the is money theyve already spent on the coronavirus and again, loss of revenue. I have an idea of the numbers from the state municipalities. But that was a cup can of weeks ago. It may have changed so well seattle yes, sir. Yesterday wasthat evidence that you can bring back the entire congress or do you think it was a demonstration, an unnecessary step, particularly on legislation Speaker Pelosi not only yesterday but our first bill, the first bill we did since weve been here. Cares one was but principled indicated on the fact that we needed to show a quorum to have a voice vote so we could show we could funk function as congress. For those who needed to stay home, they could be home. That was at an earlier stage when there was a lot more uncertainty but the capitol physician and sergeant at arms laid out a plan. I thought it was a beautiful sight to behold. I thought we got enough didnt get enough, shall we say, visibility for how we accommodated that. Used the gallery etc. , for how people were separated. Got it done in an instant. The speaker dez i guessee counts the house, the quorum was present. Everybody leaves. Yesterday was almost ease elser because you didnt have to be in the place at the same time. So that was the challenge. Timing of event, the how people were, shall we say, doing it their way but nonetheless no more than x number of people on the floor at a given tomb. That was enforced by the sergeant at arms and the capitol Physicians Office. So it showed on both occasions, when the republicans insist is on a quorum being present and wanted a recorded vote, we said no, we have a quorum or yesterday, according to what i heard from the other side, there were maybe 22 members who wanted a recorded volt vote. So the senate can do in unanimous consent, four, five members on the floor. Only need one but they probably had others who wanted to speak and we have to have the physical presence, as you said, because we know how this is going to turn out, because we were in agreement it was bipartisan. Because of that so yes, it was an example that we can get it done. As you know, we had some discussion about where we go next with in this terms of proxy voting. Clarification on a statement about leader mcconnells comments. He also said kinds of pumping the brakes on cares two that congress has to start considering dealt. What is your response to this . Peaker pelosi this is a Mitch Mcconnell who let most of the benefits go to the top 2 without saying a word. About 2 trillion with no benefit to the economy or to our childrens future, except a 2 rillion debt so that again, antigovernance, antiscience. Thats who they are. Extracurricular stuff. Thats 100 billion to hospitals. Understand that, they want to make it like we thought this up, even know they agreed to what we weer leds two weeks ago that they held this up. Lets just move forward. Until be a bill, and it will be expensive and we look forward too doing it as soon as possible because jobs are at stake, the protection and health of the American People are at stake and the sooner we get in don, the better. Yes, maam. As far as if students all ver the country. Doing fans and learning. Now tough issue of a number of groups that are criticizing this whole idea of home schooling. After this pandemic is over, will you see the whole issue of home schooling, where do you see it going . Speaker plotiony i thinking home schooling is an individual decision that people make. I dont think its a Public Policy that we advocate or not. Its what people decide they want to do and god bless them for that. I have no criticism of that. Its what their choice is. I think people want to get back to school. I think children value the socialization of beinging together with their friends scombment rest. The value of learning. Thats why i dont say one or the other. I have three in college college, four in college who are engaged in Distance Learning and they seem to be doing ok but i dont think they think of it as a bay of life. I think they want to get back to school. So thats three and i said rough three in college, three in grool. Two for. One more of them is also, five in college with Distance Learning. Finish is coming up soon in may. Same thing with the younger ones. I have one whos graduated from college. He just finished his last course work so i see it in different versions of the story and i know they want to be with their friends. Then again, its a its going to school, its going to scoop. Now, what we have to do is make sure that in times like this that every child has the same opportunity to learn. For example ncra, if you gave , theychild the Technology Still dont live in areas that have the service. And so thats why we must have a Broadband Initiative to have high speed always on social media for everyone across the country and one that operates and is able to get that done. Its not just about school. Its about telemarketing, families connecting and the rest. And among many things crone crone has taught us corona virlingse has tauths us, that its really important, not only to have your own equipment but to have the service. So many kids in inner cities, urban deserts but especially in rural america. They dont have that access and when they did, if they would go , a local library or whatever even being in the parking lot so they could have the access, those places are closed by and large. So this is something that pluck addressed and as far as home schooling, god bless people who do that because the mother of five, i used to say, four in diapers at a time and just ecause that ended because they were all very close to the same age. Hallelujah, there was a train coming at me called homework. That was ok then but now the sfoost case ca sophistication f the homework the quiths kids get is quite challenging so im a great admirer of those and a half the patience and knowhow for home schooling. Yes, sir. One question is a question of the state and local aid. If there is a state and local aid in cares two, shoulders the fed take an active role in financing state governments through this time using its new emergency living powers . Speaker pelosi with or without in will not be a bill without stuart and local. What the but the fed should be doing that anyway and anymore communication with chairman powell about what we enabled the feds to do in the last bill. I wanted the words 14 shall do in. The used the word 14 but words shall endeavor too, which is not quite the same. But nonetheless. When we originally has the conversation can can, he said i have to understand the credit worthiness of how were going to get paid back and in and that. Were in an emergency. The fed has to play a big role in all of in and theyre playing a much more stemmedsup role than they were a month and a half ago. Well see how its working and see if they need any more legislative justification. And when people go back to work. Is that an area you see will be an area of negotiation in the next bill . Speaker pelosi again, we have an array of things that have been related to the workers, whether its osha to have protections for the workers. Family medical leave, cobra, health care special enrollment period, pension support. More for Unemployment Insurance d the rest and we have prioritized or some people use the word curated what the poirlts will be so when members presents and we get all kinds of ideas. Well see what fits into how we protect the workers. Yes, maam . Could you speak to the post office . Ou mentioned it earlier. Speaker pelosi yeah, the post 90 , has an approval of barack obama, among the democrats anyway. It is approved over 90 . It is just a necessary connection for the American People, especially our seniors who get their drugs through the post office, who get their communications for many of them in that way. Right now, i see a very big danger for our country in the form of the trump administrations interest in privatizing the post office. This is just about somebody on the outside making money off of the post office instead of recognizing the Important Role that the post office plays. The most master general was one of the earliest appointments in our first cabinet. State, treasure, defense, attorney general, post master general. The fifth highest and so now you see this is really dangerous and i mentioned that treasury is trying to leverage the debt situation in a way that must be stopped. And the only way it will be stopped is if the American People understand what a loss it is for them. I dont know, people think its because the president wants to whatever it is. But i think that it predates that. I think it is privatization, antigovernment. And thats whoer in. And thats a legitimate debate to have in our country and we will have it because if we edont have a postal system, and again, all the people depend on it for, and, of course, they dont like vote by mail and activity of the crone virus, so vote by smail so important as a health issue and also melledses and all the rest that people are dependsing on, so many things theyre ordering online coming by mail. For them to be toying with in notion that they have that theyre going to privatize the postal system is something the public should be aware of and should reject. Thank you. We we has money. We asked for 20 million in cares one. We got it down to six it was bipartisan support. We had some support in the senate on the republican sides but the white house and they tell me it came right from the president no money for the post office. Instead inject lysol into your lungs as we shut down the states. Thank yall. And lets be careful about. All this policy is one thing but the personal losses we have of these families, its stagging. Im absolutely shaken by it. I kept thinking yesterday, please dont go over but how would it not when we have that administration the 900,000 who are susceptible to losing their lives. Thank you all have very much. Stay safe. Us on the phone is congressman jodey arrington. Congressman, good evening and thank you for being with us. Rep. Arrington you bet. Fuel,ngs from the food, and fiber capital of the world. Steve we are glad to have you on the program. But as begin with the president signing the stimulus plan and there is talk from the demo rats 2. 0. Bout care is from your standpoint, will that happ