During Trump’s final weeks in office as the country’s president, many issues have dominated and spiraled out of his administration’s control, including the federal funding issue. After months of toxic election movements and practice runs to stop COVID, Congress goes back again in an attempt to resolve whatever business is left to address before this year comes to a close.
The coronavirus pandemic has caused widespread the U.S government to get knocked off and spur many problems while trying to fight against it. A few of those issues include a defense policy, a finalized list of judicial candidates, COVID-19 relief, and a $1.4 trillion catchall spending package.
As the Capitol slowly comes out as a high-risk coronavirus area, time is golden for lawmakers to think of their decisions and make the final verdicts. To address many of the leftover matters that 2020 caused over, Republican Senators and Democrats join hands to have in-depth conversations over the state’s affairs through in-person lunch meetings at the White House. Despite the allegiance, it would take a definite amount of time for the two parties to get along and get their heads to focus on the real issues at hand.
For the December constitutional sessions, here are the three themes that lawmakers and the government have to discuss and resolve before this year ends:
1. COVID-19 Relief Aid
The Republicans and the Democrats got into multiple heated debates regarding the COVID-19 relief from the past several months. If both sides keep attacking each other and only abide by their respective standards, they would waste another rescue package untouched and wasted. Despite the country experiencing a surging, uncontrollable number of coronavirus cases and a severely affected economy, the aid remains out of reach and not designated for better use. When it comes to agreements, Treasury Secretary Steven Munchin is the best in handling such matters. Meanwhile, McConnell does an excellent job of negotiating sizable and smaller relief packages.
With the absence of the COVID-19 aid, it would mostly affect plans intended to get approved for the pandemic. Several of those include the reopening of educational institutions, testing and vaccines, and many different economic ideas in hopes of aiding affected employees and business firms. If Congress fails to approve legislation by December, Biden’s law-making program would consider the package as one of its top priorities.
2. Defense Policy
For this matter, Pentagon would have to relabel its bases, Fort Hood and Fort Benning, by both the Senate’s and the White House’s rulings. However, Trump rejected the proposition and even gave the warning to overrule the idea. Moreover, Trump took advantage of the argument when discussing what Confederacy is all about, trying to win over Southern voters to support him during the 2020 elections.
Georgia’s two Senate runoff elections took the defense policy as a hot issue to debate about, also helping to determine the possible results of Biden’s first two years in his term as the newly elected state president. As of late, the Democrats still push on the proposal to rename the two bases. Judging from how things are getting handled by the country’s legislature lately, seeing the proposition’s endgame is still a blurry read.
3. Maintaining the Government Open
To keep the government up and running, lawmakers must approve the “continuing resolution” bill – a proposal meant to transfer this year’s unused funds for next year’s future projects worth $1.4 trillion in total. Even though the suggestion looks like it could help alleviate the government’s financial burden, Capitol veterans Pelosi and McConnell would make the situation more challenging as they fight hard to obtain a catchall spending aid instead.
Additionally, trying to persuade Trump into signing the bill is another obstacle to overcome. In 2018, he triggered a longstanding partial government shutoff over the border wall. However, to give way for Biden’s administration to start its term anew, both parties agreed to settle the pile of unfinished measures.
