 Since Nancy Pelosi and the Democratic Party decided collectively that bailing out multi-billion-dollar companies is higher on their list of priorities Than bailing out working-class Americans who are hurting during a pandemic. They've kind of backed themselves into a corner, right? They don't really have any leverage going into future negotiations because they just gave Republicans the one thing that they wanted and let's be clear here Democratic Party leadership Nancy Pelosi Chuck Schumer. They also wanted the bailout But they also unlike Republicans have to maintain this facade that they care about working-class Americans So if you already give Republicans the one thing that they wanted what incentive do Republicans have to come to the table and Meet you even halfway on another bailout package for the American people The answer is they have no incentive and predictably now that Democrats have already played all of their cards gave away all of their bargaining chips political reports that Republicans feel absolutely no pressure to cave to the demands of Nancy Pelosi and the Democratic Party So they're saying explicitly we have absolutely no intention of working with Nancy Pelosi and Nancy Pelosi knows that she has to find some way to try and at least make it appear as if she's fighting for working-class Americans So she has one move she can make here She writes a bill and she knows it's not gonna get passed But she at least makes it a really robust bill that actually would objectively be good for working-class Americans And even if this isn't going to ever be codified into law because Mitch McConnell won't let it pass He won't allow a vote on the Senate in the Senate on this and Trump won't sign into law At least Nancy Pelosi can kind of use this as a political weapon to bludgeon Republicans over the heads with and She can excite the base by saying look if you come out and support Democrats in November This bill is what you have to look forward to and to an extent. She is doing this She is doing politically what she has to do and even if this is political theater, you know She she's doing what we expect her to do take a look I'd be partisan on their part But it's not partisan on our part to meet the needs of the American people now This is exactly what we expected But I will say it comes To two and a half months late because we're in a pandemic and people are hurting Millions of people have filed for unemployment people are literally going hungry in this country Thousands upon thousands of people are dying every single day So if Nancy Pelosi genuinely cared about the American people She wouldn't have agreed to any bill if it didn't provide Americans with adequate relief in round one Because she knows how Republicans operate. She's not a stupid person. She knows They're going to play hardball with her So if you don't get everything that you want the first go around or at least most of what you want Odds are especially if you give away everything that Republicans want to them They're not gonna come back and meet you halfway in the future So her only play now is to construct a bill that is so robust so progressive It excites the base give Americans everything that they want bring together all wings of the party bring Progressives into the fold who feel demoralized currently after a very, you know Competitive primary where we lost and adopt all of their policy proposals because it honestly doesn't matter at this point This isn't gonna pass. This isn't gonna be codified into law So she has nothing to lose and everything to gain She can make progressives feel heard if she listens to them And there's a number of demands from the Congressional Progressive Caucus that she can easily adopt and look like a hero That includes a recurring direct cash payment a moratorium on evictions and foreclosures at least $30,000 in student debt relief suspending debt collection Expanding Medicare to those who lost their jobs due to COVID fully subsidizing the cost of health care expenses for victims of COVID-19 Increasing food stamps creating a federal paycheck guarantee program Instituting vote by mail ahead of November's election because if she doesn't do this, she's basically setting up the Democratic Party for Failure, I mean she has no reason to not add all of this You have to bring progressives into the fold make them feel heard as a leader This is a sizable wing within your party So if you keep isolating them and marginalizing them, you're just going to drive them away You have no reason to not adopt all of this because we know this is just about optics. It's not gonna pass But what did we get? Well, we got a bill with some demands from progressives But even the good in this bill doesn't come without a really Bad poison pill if you want the good you're gonna have to take the bad So let's give you the rundown of what's included in this bill as Erica Werner of the Washington Post reports the 1800 page legislation which the house is expected to vote on Friday would devote nearly 1 trillion to state local territorial and tribal governments and Establish a 200 billion heroes fund to extend hazard pay to essential workers It would also send a second and larger round of direct payments to individual Americans up to 6000 per household other parts of the bill would increase nutrition assistance benefits by 15 percent and provide 175 billion and housing assistance among other things a $600 weekly increase in unemployment insurance would be extended through January and the bill directs another 75 billion for coronavirus testing and contact tracing other provisions include 25 billion for the US Postal Service a frequent target of attacks from President Trump and a new requirement for passengers and employees on Airlines public transit systems and Amtrak trains to wear masks Protections are included for legitimate cannabis related businesses and there is three billion to increase mental health support and 400 billion to help the census Bureau deal with coronavirus related delays in the 2020 census the Democrats legislation Also includes provisions to ensure that all voters can vote by mail in the November election and all subsequent federal elections an idea that Trump and many Republicans have rejected because they say it invites fraud It would be Congress's fifth coronavirus relief bill building on the two trillion dollar cares act passed in late March But while the first four bills were the result of urgent bipartisan compromise in the early days of the pandemic Now the two sides aren't even talking and are moving in radically different directions It's unclear when they will come together to produce another bipartisan response But some Republicans suggested it might not be anytime soon. So let's be objective here Let's give credit where it's due. There are some provisions in this bill that will absolutely help the American people I think increasing food stamps by 15 percent. That's really important Now I personally would have bumped it up to 25 percent give people that extra cushion because You're not going to give them too much money in this instance because it's not like they'll buy too much food And it'll go bad like you put that money on an EBT card and if they get too much It'll roll over. What matters is that people are fed. They're not going hungry and More is better than less at this point because we don't need people in America Lining up for bread lines that go multiple blocks like that's just not acceptable But I mean nonetheless, I'll take this 15 percent The $1,200 payment. It's another one-time payment. Not good enough. It needs to be recurring Why wouldn't you just adopt the $2,000 monthly recurring payment that will go to Americans throughout the duration of this pandemic? Why another one-time payment? It's not enough now. It's better than nothing. Americans would still really value this currently But there's no reason to not include a recurring payment in a bill that's not going to be passed But aside from that, you know, I don't want to be overly critical of the good provisions because there's some really important measures here But by mail crucial if Democrats want to win in November and going forward because that will increase turnout on top of that Increasing the amount of tests for COVID-19. There's some great things in here But this legislation doesn't come without its really really awful provisions For example, first of all Huffposts Matt Fuller explains that there's a provision that is a brazen giveaway to the richest 1% of Americans we're talking about Nancy Pelosi's relentless pursuit to roll back the salt tax cap It's just a brazen giveaway to the wealthiest Americans I don't know why she's so hell bent on doing this. This is a bill about optics Let me remind you nonetheless She had to include that in this bill for no reason other than to just kind of give a wink and a nod to her donors Um Who bankroll her campaign? I don't know on top of that. Uh, this headline from the Intercepts Akila Lacey and John Walker I think really says it all Heroes Act delivers a win to the health insurance industry The Heroes Act the new coronavirus relief bill introduced by House Democrats on Tuesday Includes protections for employer-sponsored insurance plans Which the healthcare industry has been lobbying congress on for weeks through proposed legislation includes subsidies for continued coverage for furloughed workers And people using cobra a continuing health coverage plan for those who have lost work Even if they don't pay their premiums the bill also creates avenues for premium assistance For certain categories of people who want to pay those premiums anyway and would open a special insurance enrollment period a week from the date It's enacted into law It also provides nine months of premium payments to health insurance plan Administrators who don't receive them during the ongoing pandemic the push to protect health insurance premiums comes as some healthcare companies like united health Humana and signa have reported profits during the pandemic amid record high Unemployment levels and have boasted that they don't expect to take a financial hit Vermont senator bernie standards wrote an op-ed on april 28th criticizing democrats push to subsidize cobra Quote subsidizing cobra as they have suggested would be both expensive and ineffective Not only would health insurance corporations make massive profits off the plan Prophets that come at the cost of the american taxpayer But it would still leave tens of millions uninsured or underinsured he wrote Expanding cobra during the pandemic would do nothing to cover those who already lacked insurance He added noting that the program subsidies for premiums would not provide relief for low-income workers Who still have to pay high deductibles? So let me remind you that in a bill that will not get passed in a bill That's just about optics to excite the base You're throwing red meat to the base Nancy Pelosi and democrats Still have to provide some giveaways to their donors and the health industry They already know that you're fighting for them Nancy Pelosi In a bill that is basically nothing more than political theater You don't have to do this you can easily Write in a quick fix you expand medicare to every single worker who lost their job because of covet 19 Now that's not good enough in my opinion, but we need quick fixes during a pandemic Expanding medicare would show people who are recently unemployed that the democratic party is fighting for them But you couldn't even do that in a bill about optics Embarrassing now on top of that it gets worse. There's a provision in this legislation That amounts to a literal bailout of corporate lobbyists as jake johnson of common dreams reports The bill which the house is expected to vote on as early as friday does not contain recurring direct cash payments A paycheck guarantee cancellation of rent and mortgage payments or expansion of medicare to cover the rapidly growing Number of unemployed and uninsured americans The legislation does however propose an expansion of the paycheck protection program eligibility to include corporate lobbying Organizations which aggressively pushed for the change and a bailout for landlords Democratic leadership has had plenty of input from progressive thinkers over the past couple of months They just care more about the input from corporate lobbyists tweeted huff post senior reporter zack carter There is just no excuse for this. So we are rolling back to solid cap. We are Bailing out corporate lobbyists literally. Oh and in case I didn't bring this up earlier We're also bailing out debt collectors and landlords And how many of the progressive provisions were adopted About less than half again This is about optics this bill will not be passed. I know I sound like a broken record, but I have to keep overstating that So people understand Just how ridiculous this is now again the bill itself is not all bad But with the good you take a lot of really horrible provisions Horrible provisions and with those horrible provisions. You still don't get adequate relief for americans so You can maybe maybe make the case that if we got everything on the congressional progressive caucus's wishlist, maybe Those bad things would be acceptable because she's trying to bring together both the corporate and progressive wings Of the party, but she really uh, Sent the message to the left again that she doesn't really care about them now nancy Pelosi was actually challenged by representative promilla jaya paul and she sent it off about this on twitter explaining why This bill is weak like it's not awful. It's not 100 bad, but it's still not adequate It still doesn't go far enough when people are hurting and we have to think big Now here's the thing. I absolutely admire that promilla jaya paul Is speaking up She's one of the few progressives who actually does challenge nancy polosi from time to time Even if she does go along with a lot of what nancy polosi wants But she just tweeted this out if i'm promilla jaya paul I'm not just going to tweet this out. I'm going to call up msnbc. I'm going to go on cnn I'm going to drag nancy polosi for this Because even if there are some good things some more crumbs for the peasants It doesn't go far enough So don't let nancy polosi hide behind some of the good things that are in this bill To push for her pro corporate agenda where she literally bills out corporate lobbyists You can't let her do that. You can't let her monopolize Discourse surrounding the heroes act. You've got to name her and shame her explicitly And I get that that's really going to be awkward for you because she's your colleague. She's your boss But let's be real here progressives have really got to start fighting fire with fire playing hardball Because you are a sizable enough caucus now to where you actually have some leverage You just got to use it like rocona aoc Pramila jaya paul even katie porter who's more of a warren democrat these individuals They have leverage They have to use it They've got to fight fire with fire and play hardball and not be afraid to call out leadership Like I admire her for calling out nancy polosi through twitter But let's be real that's not enough like look at what the freedom caucus was able to accomplish They're a minority within the republican party, but they absolutely never Hesitated to give the republican party establishment and leadership specifically hell They would hold up any legislation that didn't meet their criteria and they were successful In shifting the overton window to the right and the aggregate republican party further and further to the right So if you don't adopt some of the political strategy that we saw from the freedom caucus Knowing that you have a pretty sizable caucus yourself You're not going to be successful. I think that you know tepidly wording a dismissal of this bill and its weaknesses on twitter isn't going to suffice you have to actually whip the votes get members of the progressive congressional caucus To not vote on this not support this not back nancy polosi when she needs you because if she knows You're going to be there for her like that And every time she says jump you say hi how high She's never ever ever going to actually take you seriously. She's always going to take you for granted So um, you know, I think that What progressives and the left collectively need to learn from this Is that Democrats don't take the left seriously because the left is always there for democrats when they need them So what we have to do going forward is withhold votes don't vote on nancy polosi's legislation Don't let her hold committee appointments over your head actually fight fire with hot fire And if she wants to blast you go on corporate media Go on corporate media and blast her back corporate media will side with the nancy polosi But if you can at least Force her to defend herself for the first time from within the democratic party Maybe that can make a difference now you could fail doing this But at least trying and failing is better than not trying not fighting fire with fire not fighting hard enough against These corporate democrats who are using every single institutional mechanism to silence And uh, marginalize the left further So, you know this bill again, I don't want to say it's all bad because if this bill were to pass There'd be some really good provisions in this that would help the american people objectively speaking But we shouldn't be forced every single time to take Some good with a lot of really harmful provisions That come with it. We shouldn't do that Especially when we're talking about a bill that is political theater. It's just about optics Can't we at least for once in a bill that's not going to get passed? Have it just be clean have no giveaways to corporate america? Well, I mean, I think we can But we just have to start using our voices people in congress specifically progressives Have to use their voices more effectively And I think they've really got to come together bind together And they've got to agree to be a very strong and vocal block because if they don't actually start applying adequate pressure On leadership, they're not going to get what they want They will continue to be steamrolled with whole votes not just for these bills, but for leadership positions You've got to fight them if you don't things like this are going to continue to happen And look, I criticize Nancy Pelosi often because you know, I say that she doesn't know how to play politics When you see the way that she fights against republicans But I'm going to walk back everything that I said about Nancy Pelosi with regard to her not being strategically savvy because she is savvy, right? She knows how to play politics. We we see the way that she plays politics against the left It's just that she's not playing politics with the republicans because She agrees with them She agrees with them on economic issues. So why would she fight them when they're doing What's good for her what she wants what is that the behest of her donors quite frankly? So she knows what she's doing. She knows how to marginalize the left And play them like a fiddle and it's time that congressional progressives put their foot down And not accept this anymore