Progressives Blast GOP Calls to End $300 Weekly Unemployment: 'Greed Has No Bounds' On 5/8/21 at 3:36 PM EDT Progressive lawmakers pushed back hard after some Republicans and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce called for ending extra $300 weekly unemployment payments to jobless workers amid the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. GOP lawmakers and the Chamber of Congress, a pro-business lobby group that generally backs Republican candidates, blamed extra federal unemployment payments approved by Congress in the American Rescue Plan for the significantly less than expected job growth in April. The Department of Labor released the April jobs report on Friday, showing that the economy added just 266,000 jobs last month despite predictions that it would be closer to 1 million.