Fairfax, Va.—Americans for Limited Government President Rick Manning today issued the following statement urging opposition to the $1.9 trillion Covid spending bill:

“The answer to the government-induced economic slowdown is not more government spending and intervention, but instead is for state and federal governments to get out of the economic shutdown business entirely and reopen America now.  Yet, the partisan Democrat $1.9 trillion Covid-19 bill doesn’t do anything to rectify the ongoing economic havoc being wrought by states like California, Michigan, New York and New Jersey, and instead provides massive bailouts for poorly run states.  The bill has next to nothing to do with expanding medical treatment or vaccine availability, but instead is a laundry list of spending that should be debated as part of the regular budget rather than as part of an emergency. Only about one-sixth of the legislation even goes to combating Covid.

“Americans for Limited Government strongly urges opposition to the Covid-19 $1.9 trillion boondoggle.  For perspective of how much money $1.9 trillion is, the amount of money collected by the federal government in 2020 from all sources was $3.4 Trillion, so with this one unnecessary spending splurge that Democrats will spend 56 percent of the entire amount raised into the U.S. Treasury last year. If Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer want to bailout poorly run states, let them go through regular order to convince their colleagues to pay for it.

“The simple reality is that this stimulus is not needed. The Atlanta Fed GDPNow forecasts 10 percent growth in the first quarter of 2021, based on the more than $3 trillion stimulus already passed under the Trump administration. This new $1.9 trillion spend, including more than $400 billion for checks, is just so Joe Biden can say he signed a check to Americans, too.

“Last year’s massive emergency Covid-19 spending was necessary to undo the damage being done by federal and state government actions to flatten the curve.  Now it is time to stop the emergency spending insanity and return to regular order.  If Democrats want to spend taxpayer dollars on state, local and union bailouts, they should debate them separately rather than creating the world’s biggest Christmas tree with massive giveaways for all their favorite supporters.”

Attachments:

$1.9 trillion Covid spending bill passes House, goes back to Senate—but will it help recover the 8.7 million jobs still lost to pandemic?, By Robert Romano, March 1, 2021 at https://dailytorch.com/2021/03/1-9-trillion-covid-spending-bill-passes-house-goes-back-to-senate-but-will-it-help-recover-the-8-7-million-jobs-still-lost-to-pandemic/

Interview Availability: Please contact Americans for Limited Government at 703-383-0880 or email media@limitgov.org.