On Sunday, a group of 10 Republican Senators sent a letter to President Joe Biden, proposing a more modest COVID-19 relief bill "in the spirit of bipartisanship and unity" to counter Biden's $1.9 trillion relief and recovery plan.
The group of 10 Senators – Sens. Susan Collins (R-ME), Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Bill Cassidy (R-LA), Mitt Romney (R-UT), Rob Portman (R-OH), Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV), Todd Young (R-IN), Jerry Moran (R-KS), Mike Rounds (R-SD), and Thom Tillis (R-NC) – requested a meeting with President Biden to discuss the measure, which would include $160 billion for "vaccine development and distribution, testing and tracing, treatment and supplies, including the production and deployment of personal protective equipment."
"Our proposal reflects many of your stated priorities, and with your support, we believe that this plan could be approved quickly by Congress with bipartisan support," the letter reads, in part. "We request the opportunity to meet with you to discuss our proposal in greater detail and how we can work together to meet the needs of the American people during this persistent pandemic."
The letter goes on to say that the Republican counter includes "includes economic relief for those Americans with the greatest need, providing more targeted assistance than in the Administration’s plan," resources for getting children back to school, extending federal unemployment benefits, and "fully funding" Biden's request "for nutrition assistance to help struggling families."
The Senators will unveil more details of their plan Monday. They did not reveal the overall cost of their proposal, though they said it would be smaller than the $1.9 trillion price tag of the Biden package.
“My hope is that the president will meet with us and we’ll be able to work out something that is bipartisan,” said Sen. Portman said on CNN Sunday.
Brian Deese, the top White House economic adviser who has been leading the administration’s outreach to Congress, said administration officials were reviewing the letter. He did not immediately commit to Biden meeting with the lawmakers.
Deese, also speaking to CNN Sunday, signaled the White House could be open to negotiating with Republicans on their proposal on further limiting who would receive stimulus checks.
"That is certainly a place that we’re willing to sit down and think about," Deese asked, "Are there ways to make the entire package more effective?"
The fact that 10 Senators signed the letter is notable – namely because the relief measure would require 60 votes to pass, and the support of 10 Republican Senators, combined with the 50 Democrats currently in the Senate, would put the bill over the top.
The standoff over Biden's COVID-19 relief bill – his top legislative priority – is turning the new rescue plan into a political test: Of his new administration, of Democratic control of Congress and of the role of Republicans in a post-Trump political landscape.
Congressional Democrats are drafting a budget reconciliation bill that would start the process to pass Biden's relief package with a simple 51-vote Senate majority — rather than the 60-vote threshold typically needed in the Senate to advance legislation. The goal would be passage by March, when jobless benefits, housing assistance and other aid is set to expire.
This isn't an unprecedented move – Congressional Republicans utilized the reconciliation process to pass the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017, former president Donald Trump's signature legislative achievement.
Speaking from the Oval Office on Friday, Biden and Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen called for swift action on the relief bill.
"The choice couldn't be clearer," Biden said. "We have learned from past crises that the risk is not doing too much. The risk is not doing enough. And this is a time to act now."
"There is an overwhelming consensus among economists — left, right and center — that this is a unique moment in this crisis, and the cost of inaction is high and is growing every day," he added.
“The president is absolutely right. The price of doing nothing is much higher than the price of doing something, and doing something big," Yellen said, pointing to unemployment data released a day earlier. "We need to act now, and the benefits of acting now and acting big will far outweigh the costs in the long run."
Senate Republicans in a bipartisan group warned their colleagues in a “frank” conversation late Wednesday that Biden and Democrats are making a mistake by loading up the aid bill with other priorities and jamming it through Congress without their support, according to a person familiar with the matter who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the private session.
Sen. Portman (R-OH), a former White House budget director under George W. Bush, wants a deeper accounting of what funds remain from the $900 billion coronavirus aid package from December.
"Literally, the money has not gone out the door,” he said. “I’m not sure I understand why there’s a grave emergency right now."
Biden spoke directly with Sen. Collins, who is leading the bipartisan effort with Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) that is racing to strike a compromise.
Collins said she and the president had a "good conversation."
"We both expressed our shared belief that it is possible for the Senate to work in a bipartisan way to get things done for the people of this country," she said.
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said Friday that members of the administration have reached out to governors, state governments, Black civic groups, and anti-hunger and nutrition advocates in recent days to make their pitch. Vice President Kamala Harris, meanwhile, has done a number of local media interviews.
"These conversations are, of course, critical to building support and moving the president’s bill forward," Psaki said.
Psaki cited a recent Monmouth University poll that showed that 71% of Americans, including 41% of Republicans, want the GOP to work with Biden on a deal.
"I think a fair question you might ask our GOP, our Republican colleagues, is why they oppose proposals that have the support of 71% of the American public," Psaki said.
On Thursday, more than 120 economists and policymakers signed a letter in support of Biden’s package, saying the $900 billion that Congress approved in December before he took office was “too little and too late to address the enormity of the deteriorating situation."
Employers shed workers in December, retail sales have slumped and COVID-19 deaths kept rising. More than 430,000 people in the U.S. have died from the coronavirus as of Thursday.
At the same time, the number of Americans applying for unemployment benefits remained at a historically high 847,000 last week, and a new report said the U.S. economy shrunk by an alarming 3.5% last year.
"The risks of going too small dramatically outweigh the risks of going too big," said Gene Sperling, a former director of the White House National Economic Council, who signed the letter.
The government reported Thursday that the economy showed dangerous signs of stalling in the final three months of last year, ultimately shrinking in size by 3.5% for the whole of 2020 — the sharpest downturn since the demobilization that followed the end of World War II.
The decline was not as severe as initially feared, largely because the government has steered roughly $4 trillion in aid, an unprecedented emergency expenditure, to keep millions of Americans housed, fed, employed and able to pay down debt and build savings amid the crisis.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.