House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., blasted President Trump on Sunday for the lack of progress made between Congress and White House negotiators on another coronavirus relief bill and accused Trump of being responsible for the mounting death in the country due to the pandemic.
“More than 4 million have been added to the infection list because we paused,” Pelosi said on CNN’s “State of the Union” about delays in testing and tracing. “Over 80,000 more people have died, because they paused.”
“Could we have saved all of those lives? Not all, but many,” Pelosi continued before paraphrasing a line from the speech made by Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-VT., at the Democratic National Convention last week. “Trump fiddles while Rome burns, while America burns.”
More than 176,000 people in the United States have died from the novel coronavirus, while more than 5.6 million people have been infected by the contagion.
Pelosi earlier in the week recalled the House back into session to pass legislation that would reverse recent changes in U.S. Postal Service operations and send $25 billion to shore up the agency ahead of the November election.
Pelosi recalled lawmakers to Washington over objections from Republicans dismissing the action as a stunt. Trump urged a no vote, including in a Saturday tweet, railing against mail-in ballots expected to surge in the COVID-19 crisis. He has said he wants to block extra funds to the Postal Service.
“Don’t pay any attention to what the president is saying, because it is all designed to suppress the vote,” Pelosi said at the Capitol.
Pelosi called the Postal Service the nation’s “beautiful thread” connecting Americans and said voters should “ignore” the president’s threats.
The daylong session came as an uproar over mail disruptions puts the Postal Service at the center of the nation’s tumultuous election year, with Americans rallying around one of the nation’s oldest and more popular institutions. Millions of people are expected to opt for mail-in ballots to avoid polling places during the coronavirus pandemic.
More than two dozen Republicans broke with the president and backed the bill, which passed 257-150. Democrats led approval, but the legislation is certain to stall in the GOP-held Senate. The White House said the president would veto it.
