Stimulus checks back in the mix! (Yang gang lobbying influence?)

The Hill's headline story right now:  Senate GOP looks to stopgap as relief talks drag on

BY JORDAIN CARNEY - 12/17/20 11:36 AM EST

Top Senate Republicans indicated on Thursday that Congress is increasingly likely to need a days-long stopgap government funding bill as talks on a coronavirus package and mammoth funding deal drag out.

Congressional leaders and the Trump administration are working to clinch a massive package that would tie a roughly $900 billion coronavirus deal to a $1.4 trillion government funding package. They need to pass it by Friday night in order to prevent a shutdown.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) indicated that Congress would in all likelihood miss that deadline, saying on the Senate floor that a rare weekend session was "highly likely."

"If we need to further extend the Friday funding deadline before final legislation can pass in both chambers, I hope we'll extend it for a very, very short window of time," McConnell said [....]

while the #1 story on their most-popular list is this one from early this morning:

McConnell getting much of what he wants in emerging relief deal

BY ALEXANDER BOLTON AND SCOTT WONG - 12/17/20 06:00 AM EST

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) is getting much of what he wants in an emerging coronavirus relief package, after months of digging in his heels against a demand by Democratic leaders to pass a multitrillion-dollar package that would shore up the ailing finances of state and local governments.

The GOP leader isn’t getting liability protection for businesses and other organizations but McConnell himself last week proposed dropping that controversial item along with another large tranche of funding for state and local government. 

State and local funding was a top priority of Speaker Nancy Pelosi 

(D-Calif.) and Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.).Democrats are getting $90 billion in relief for local governments but it will be distributed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency, meaning city and state leaders will have less control. Democrats say that money for housing assistance will also help ease the fiscal burdens on states. 

But McConnell is getting a deal a lot closer to what Democrats dismissed as the “emaciated” plan he pushed in recent months than the $2.2 trillion HEROES Act that Pelosi and Schumer said should have been the “starting point” of the talks.

That was quickly leading to some criticism on Wednesday as it emerged the sides were closing in on an agreement, though in Congress, some Democrats taking shots at the package still said it should be approved.

“This is not any place close to what is needed,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said of the emerging $900 billion deal. But Warren said Democrats have little choice but to accept a much smaller relief package than they wanted in order to get a deal.“That makes for a very difficult negotiation,” she said of McConnell’s staunch insistence on a “targeted” package below $1 trillion. She faulted the GOP leader, saying “Mitch McConnell is willing to let American families walk away with nothing.”

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) similarly criticized the bill while giving his blessing to its outlines [....]