‘Perhaps you mistook them for somebody who gave a damn’: Pelosi slams GOP for stalled talks on virus relief package

WASHINGTON — Frankly, they don’t give a damn, Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said Thursday of President Trump and Republicans in the Senate.

Asked about meeting Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and the White House in the middle in talks for a new coronavirus relief package — and perhaps getting half a loaf — the House Speaker ripped the Republicans not even coming close, or caring about the impacts of delayed federal aid.

“This is not half a loaf. This is not even being in the same room,” Pelosi told the reporter who inquired. “Perhaps you mistook them for somebody who gave a damn. That isn’t the case.”

Pelosi pointed to a chart she brought to her weekly news conference showing some of the largest gaps between Democratic and GOP proposals for a new rescue package, including $60 billion Dems want for hunger relief versus the $250,000 Republicans have sought, and the $100 billion Pelosi wants to fight evictions compared to nothing on the GOP side.

Any hope of a deal vanished when McConnell adjourned the Senate until September 8, more than three weeks from now.

The two parties made almost no progress in agreeing on what to do to help the country combat COVID-19 and its economic devastation since the House passed a $3.4 trillion bill three months ago.

The Senate and White House accuse the Democrats of refusing to negotiate, though both Pelosi and Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (N.Y.) have both said they would be willing to cut $1 trillion from their side.

McConnell stood by his position Thursday, speaking on the Senate floor as Pelosi hammered him and Trump to reporters.

“I would hope our Democratic colleagues would let the Senate act sometime soon,” McConnell said.

He has argued repeatedly that Democrats larded up their bill with items that McConnell describes as a left-wing partisan wish list, such as voting aid, a Postal Service bailout, $1 trillion for state and local governments, and a boost in state and local tax breaks.

"Instead of staying focused on the real needs of our nation, these two Democratic leaders have held the talks hostage — for weeks now — over non-COVID-related ideological items which the political left has wanted since long before this virus hit our shores," McConnell said.

Pelosi saw it very differently, noting that McConnell himself said Congress needed to take a pause after it passed the previous massive aid legislation, the Cares Act, in March.

"Ninety days ago, Congress passed the Heroes Act -- 90 days," she said, adding that since then 3.75 million Americans have gotten COVID-19, 77,000 have died and tens of millions have lost jobs. "Clearly, the virus did not take a pause."

She also savaged Trump and the GOP for down-playing the crisis all along.

“For months, and even until now, they have ignored the science,” Pelosi said, referring particularly to Trump’s claims dismissals of the threats. “Magically it would go away. It was a hoax. No. They are the hoax.”