Here & Now

U.S. Rep. Pocan Breaks Down Emergency Aid Package

Frederica Freyberg:

For those who have lost their jobs, their businesses or who are sick, help is on the way in the form of a $2 trillion stimulus package passed this week by the U.S. Senate and the House just today. The president signed it this afternoon. We invited Wisconsin U.S. Representative Mike Gallagher to join us this week, but with last-minute changes to his schedule, he could not join us. Instead, Representative Gallagher provided us with this statement. “What we face is first and foremost a public health crisis and our primary goal must be to get this disease under control. Until we do so, there’s no amount of federal dollars that will allow us to keep our economy shut down indefinitely. Recognizing this, the CARES Act surges badly needed resources to the hospital systems, health care workers and first responders on the front lines of this fight. It devotes billions of dollars toward testing and other critical supplies and builds on the bipartisan efforts I’ve lead to ensure states like Wisconsin have the resources they need to defeat this disease.” Now, the emergency stimulus called the CARES Act includes direct payments to individuals, retention loans to small businesses so they can keep their workers, expanded unemployment benefits and hundreds of billions of dollars to hospitals and states. We are joined tonight by Democratic U.S. Representative Mark Pocan. Thanks for joining us.

Mark Pocan:

Thank you Frederica. Glad to be here.

Frederica Freyberg:

First tell us about why you support this historic spending.

Mark Pocan:

Because we need it desperately. And we’re probably going to have another package down the road. What’s happening across the country and certainly in Wisconsin we’re seeing it as having a devastating impact on small businesses and big businesses, people’s health. We’re putting our hospitals and health care systems at full capacity and almost over capacity. So we need to get this package done. It’s important. It’s going to put money into people’s pockets who are right now unemployed for no fault of their own. We’ve all been rowing together. Democrats and Republicans try to deal with this and I think that’s really important.

Frederica Freyberg:

Could you name who the biggest beneficiaries are of this package?

Mark Pocan:

People who have lost their jobs at no fault of their own, small business owners, some of the big businesses, like airlines, are going to benefit. Hospitals are going to see money. Local governments are going to see money. There’s a lot. When you have $2 trillion, there’s a lot in here. But honestly, I think more needs to happen especially for some of our small business owners, for people who may be undocumented immigrants, a number of other things got into politics and we need to make sure that everyone is in a place that they’re either being made whole or able to get testing. Because right now, all of that’s crucial to making sure we can overcome this.

Frederica Freyberg:

And you think that another piece of legislation will be forthcoming?

Mark Pocan:

Extremely likely. We’ve already talked about some of the gaps we didn’t have in this package that need to happen in a fourth package. And again, we’re going to try to be committed to working on this in a bipartisan way. I can just tell you in Wisconsin, Mike Gallagher, you just read a statement from. He and I talk on the phone daily and we’ve been able to find some solution, finding companies that have the ability to do tests. We’re finding needs with FEMA in the state to make sure their needs are matching. It’s just real important that we do what we can here on the ground right now but we’re going to need another package.

Frederica Freyberg:

In terms of these direct payments to people, when might people see this money?

Mark Pocan:

So the check, they’re saying about three weeks. The $1200 check to people who make less than $75,000 as an individual or $150,000 as a couple. For people on unemployment, hopefully much sooner. And we’re using the state’s system. There’s already a system set up to deliver that money. So that should be a little easier. What will happen is people will be able to get up to the state max plus $600 a week for the next four months. So people who have the average income in Wisconsin, if you’re unemployed, you should be made whole for the next four months if you are out of work.

Frederica Freyberg:

Because Wisconsin is seeing some 20,000 unemployment claims a day starting Monday of this week. So it’s really bad out there.

Mark Pocan:

Yeah. My business was forced to close. I’m not essential. So I am living this with everyone else. And we’re trying to make sure that everyone’s taken care of. The good news is this bill will take care of people largely. But I want to make sure that small businesses are able to get to a position they can bring them back to work and I think there’s a few gaps still in what we need to do there.

Frederica Freyberg:

You have additional legislation in mind which would keep workers employed.

Mark Pocan:

Yeah. There’s a work share proposal within unemployment insurance where people can start to get back to work at maybe 25 or 50% of hours but still be able to access unemployment. So at the end of the day, the worker will have more money in their pocket than just being unemployed. The business can ramp back up into productivity because you’re not going to instantly turn into 100% productivity and you saved the state UI account money by allowing this to happen. We have it in Wisconsin. 27 states have it. But honestly, it needs tweaks. It’s hard to access. We need to do some changes at the federal level as well. I’ve been talking to everyone from Speaker Vos to the governor about it. I think it’s a good idea and I hope we can make it happen.

Frederica Freyberg:

We’re hearing workers in essential industry or factory positions that are still on the job are worried about having to work with the potential of contracting COVID-19 from the person next to them. What about those concerns? We talk about obviously people losing their jobs. Really bad. Businesses having to close. But then there are these people who are worried about being declared essential employees in a factory or a plant job.

Mark Pocan:

And a couple hundred dollar bonus from Walmart is not going to cut it if you’re exposed like that. So there are some standards in this bill. But that’s part of why a fourth bill, too. I think we need even more standards by OSHA to protect every worker who right now is doing essential things. People making ventilators, running our tests to see if people have COVID-19 and operating our grocery stores and gas stations. I mean these are all things– everyone has to be protected. Some of that’s in this bill. I think more has to happen in the next one.

Frederica Freyberg:

We need to leave it there. Thanks very much for joining us, Representative Mark Pocan.

Mark Pocan:

Thank you.