U.S. Lawmakers Near Deal With White House on Coronavirus Aid Bill

U.S. lawmakers and the White House neared agreement on a coronavirus economic aid package, House Speaker 👤Nancy Pelosi said on Thursday, adding she hoped to announce a deal on Friday.

The Democratic-controlled House of Representatives and the Republican-controlled Senate have been at odds over the legislation. Pelosi, a Democrat, spent much of Thursday haggling with Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, who was handling the negotiations for the President 👤Donald Trump’s Republican administration.

Pelosi and Mnuchin spoke by telephone eight times, Pelosi spokesman Drew Hammill said. They were “close to an agreement subject to an exchange of paper and we hope to have an agreement tomorrow,” Pelosi told reporters Thursday evening, vowing to bring the matter to a vote in the House on Friday.

“We’ve resolved most of our differences,” Pelosi said. It was not clear whether some important disagreements still had to be worked out.

Pelosi repeatedly stressed that the bill must encourage Americans to be tested for the coronavirus and not have to be worried about the cost.

“It’s about testing, testing, testing,” she said.

A House Republican aide said Republicans were not opposed to free testing, but that some technical aspects of the legislation needed to be fixed.

Pelosi and her fellow Democrats on Wednesday evening made a 124-page proposal to expand paid sick leave, unemployment insurance, funding for child nutrition and other food programs, and introduce other sweeping steps to address economic hardships that the growing Coronavirus Outbreak