Marco Rubio expects Senate vote on emergency virus relief deal Monday

Sen. Marco Rubio said he expects the Senate to vote Monday on the interim emergency bill to re-fund key aspects of the coronavirus stimulus package.

“If no senator objects, by flying down to D.C. and blocking it, it will then go over to the House,” Mr. Rubio, Florida Republican and chairman of the Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, said in a video message on Twitter.

House Democrats sent a notice to members late Sunday night that they should expect votes as soon as Wednesday on the package.

Initially, Republicans wanted an additional $251 billion to re-fund the small business paycheck protection program (PPP), but Democrats held out to extend funds to other key areas such as hospitals and state and local governments.

Generally, lawmakers agreed that all of those items needed more funding, but clashed on whether Congress should address them all together or in more narrow bills.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said Sunday the deal lawmakers were eyeing was now closer to $300 billion for the PPP, as well as $50 billion for disaster loans, $75 billion for hospitals and $25 billion to expand coronavirus testing.

Mr. Rubio called for the Small Business Administration to prep the updates to the system included in this upcoming bill — intended to help smaller banks — so there isn’t a crash Thursday when the funds are ready to use.

“My concern is that we don’t waste the next three days,” he said. “We already have a bunch of applications that are backlogged — like [800,000] or 900,000 applications ready to go. We can’t afford any more delays.”