Usa Freedom Reauthorization Act of 2020

Floor Speech

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Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I come here to speak on a different topic, but I want to simply comment for a moment on the exchange between my friend from Louisiana and my friend from Florida.

I can assure my friend from Louisiana who was ranked the best managed State in America by an independent source, Governing Magazine--the Commonwealth of Virginia--at least during my tenure as Governor. We are also proud to be ranked by Forbes Magazine the best State for business.

I have looked at the bill of the Senator from Louisiana. It may not be perfect. I actually think we should be voting on it. I think it is a bit strange to me, and I say this as somebody from Virginia, where I am very proud of the fact that we have maintained a AAA bond rating. We are fiscally responsible. Our fiscal health, I would wager, is candidly better than virtually every other State in the country. We made the hard choices to make that happen.

When we say that we are going to come in and bail out the airlines because they have lost revenues and we are going to come in and very generously take care of every small business when they have lost revenues, but when States and localities across the country are losing revenues at a record rate, to say we are not going to give them certain flexibility--I would concur, if we had a bill like that, and I would even put a clause and support a clause in place that would say let's prohibit any of those funds being used to take care of long-term obligations like pension funds. But the notion that somehow we are going to say we are going to take care of everybody else who lost revenues but we are not going to take care of a local government that has seen its meals tax dry up, its lodging tax dry up, its sales tax dry up, and you suddenly are on your own and you have to lay off police officers and firefighters and EMTs at this moment in time, it doesn't make sense to me. I hope the Senator will continue to press his case and we will get a chance to have that debate Coronavirus

Mr. President, I rise today because we also face the greatest unemployment crisis America has seen since the Great Depression. More than 33 million workers have lost their jobs due to the coronavirus pandemic. Millions of these folks have also lost their health insurance. I was just reading that 27 million Americans have seen their health insurance lost due to the virus. The Federal Reserve actually forecasts that 47 million Americans, or nearly one-third of the workforce, could lose their jobs.

These aren't just numbers. They represent the pain being felt by families across the country, as we enter into the greatest economic crisis of our lifetime. Candidly, we need to face some hard truths about how we got here and what will come next if we fail to act.

The reason we are facing this dire economic crisis is simple: The Federal Government failed to take the appropriate early actions to control this virus.

That is why we have had to do social distancing. Social distancing isn't very much fun. I see some of my friends and colleagues on the floor. It is particularly hard for people who spend their lifetime shaking hands and saying hello to folks. It has been tough on all of us. But it has saved lives, and it has begun to flatten the curve.

We also know that things can't just go back to normal overnight--not before we have a vaccine, not before the government, working in concert with the private sector, solves the chronic shortages in testing and in PPE that have hampered our response to this pandemic from day one.

States like mine are working toward a new normal where we gradually scale back social distancing, when it is safe to do so, but it is just not realistic to suggest, as the President has, that we can just immediately reopen the economy before we have contained the virus--as if companies will just simply resume normal business, knowing that another coronavirus outbreak could shut them down any day, as if a virus for which we still don't have a vaccine didn't just kill more than 80,000 of our fellow Americans.

It is time to face the facts, about what it will take for our economy to recover from this public health crisis. There is not a magic switch that we can just flip. Unfortunately, there will not be a V-shaped recovery if we stay on our current course. Just as it took the U.S. years to emerge from the Great Depression, it could take years, or even decades, to recover from the coronavirus if we do not take immediate, bold action in the next coronavirus relief bill.

Our first goal must be to prevent further job losses, as well as permanent disruptions like business closures, evictions, and foreclosures.

Second, we must work quickly to reduce the economic uncertainty facing workers and small businesses. To do this, we need to provide immediate assistance to millions of American workers who have gone overnight from a steady job to unemployment through no fault of their own.

I am not talking about another stimulus check. I am not talking about unemployment benefits. I am talking about paychecks. The proposal, which I put forward with Senator Sanders, Senator Jones, and Senator Blumenthal would create a national paycheck security program for American workers. A very similar proposal has been put forward by my friend on the other side of the aisle, Senator Hawley from Missouri. It uses a direct support model that has support on both the left and the right. As a matter of fact, the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal have both commented on it. We know those news organizations never agree on anything, but they both take this approach. It bears merit. We also know this direct support approach works because it has been implemented successfully in a number of European countries and in Canada, where the unemployment rates, yes, have bumped up by a couple of points but not to the level of what, I believe, will be over 20 percent unemployment and what the Fed and even the administration officials have predicted may reach 25 percent within the next month.

Paycheck security means the Federal Government would help to cover the payroll expenses for rank-and-file workers who have been furloughed or laid off because of the coronavirus. These Treasury Department grants would cover salaries and wages up to $90,000 for each employee, plus benefits, and would run for at least 6 months. They would also provide funds to many businesses to help cover business operating costs, such as rent and utilities.

The program would be delivered through the employee retention tax credit, which is something on which I was happy to work with my friend from Oregon in the earlier coronavirus bill. It is already set up at the IRS and can be leveraged to deliver far greater benefits than it currently provides.

In exchange for the paycheck security grant, employers would commit to forgoing further layoffs and to maintaining the pay and benefits of their rank-and-file workers. They would also be required to suspend stock buybacks and limit CEO compensation for at least the term of Federal assistance.

A national paycheck security program would immediately work to prevent financial calamity for millions and millions of American families. At the same time, it would maintain and, in many cases, reestablish that critical link between workers and their employees. The reestablishment of that link would put in place the healthcare benefits that many workers receive through their employment that they have now lost even though they may be on generous unemployment. If we reestablish this connection, the economy will be able to bounce back much more quickly after the public health crisis ends. The certainty provided by this program would also give consumers the confidence they need to begin spending money in the economy, which would accelerate the eventual economic recovery.

It will be expensive. Yet I can say this: As someone who has spent a long time thinking about and working on trying to reduce the deficit, when we compare it to the over $660 billion spent on the PPP program, which has only taken up one section of our economy--businesses under 500--but has done nothing so far for those mid-level businesses--500 to 10,000--I think the alternative will actually be viewed as being much cheaper. It would actually be pennies compared to the damage that will be done if we fail to adequately assist our fellow Americans in this moment of economic crisis.

I am pleased that my colleagues in the House have put forward an initial draft of their view of the next coronavirus relief package. It has a number of important provisions. However, it has not taken what I believe is the bold step of saying, before we simply refill some of the existing buckets--which have had, in many cases, mixed results so far-- perhaps we should take a pause and a timeout and ask: Is there not a better way to provide the kind of security and guarantee that the American people are looking for from their government?

The one thing I do know is that my House colleagues and I share an enormous sense of urgency. With, at least, the official number of unemployment being at nearly 15 percent--a number that all of us expect to go over 20 percent when it is reported later this month--this is not the time to play wait and see. It is no exaggeration to say that we face the prospect of having not a recession but of having, actually, a great depression. With every day we delay, we drive ourselves deeper and deeper into the hole that we must eventually climb out of when the healthcare crisis is behind us.

As we enter into negotiations over the next phase of the coronavirus response, I would encourage my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to take a look at bold solutions. Let's give our fellow Americans the kind of paycheck security they deserve. Let's put paychecks, not stimulus checks, in their hands. Let's help them get back to work as fast and as safely we are able.

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