by Dhiren Shah
Hello Readers,
Are Trump’s lawyers failing to defend Trump in his second impeachment hearing? They have already lost one Republican Senator who said a month ago that he would vote against the impeachment proceedings because the impeachment was wrong. Bill Cassidy of Louisiana was upset with the way Trump’s lawyers presented their opening arguments. He joined five other Republican senators – Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mitt Romney of Utah, Ben Sasse of Nebraska and Patrick J. Toomey of Pennsylvania as being in favor of the proceedings.
All six senators are free to vote whether to impeach the president or not, but at least as of right now, they want the proceedings and want to hear the facts. For impeachment, the Democrats need 67 votes. There are 50 Democrats (including two independents) and six republicans (if they vote in favor of impeachment). Still, they are short by 11 votes. One of the “Local Talk” reader came to me and said that the Democrats might give each Republican senator $20 million. I do not know how he came up with such an idea, but I think it’s fake news.
Another influential person told me that the Trump administration has made such a mess with the vaccine distribution, that the Biden administration is having a hard time to get some smooth sailing. He also told me that the Trump administration has not given the Biden administration easy access to information. However, it will eventually settled and organized with a month or two.
Due to the weak performance from Donald Trump’s team of lawyers, Trump and some of the Republicans are upset. Now they are preparing more videos for their presentation. For the Democrats, they want to make sure that Trump cannot run again in 2024 and his side becomes weaker in the upcoming election for the House and Senate as well in 2022.
Local businesses are struggling and need help. The government has tried their best with some huge programs. One stimulus package gave almost every adult $1,200 and $500 per child around March 2020. At the end of 2020, some people received $600 more in another stimulus package, while some received it early in 2021. Biden has promised to give another $1,400, and as soon as the bill passes, he will sign it.
The Second economic booster was giving $600 per week to unemployed persons for few months in 2020. The best program to boost smaller businesses was PPP (paycheck Protection Program). Also, SBA loans helped smaller businesses as well, but they have to be repaid over the course of 30 years.
In 2021, under the Biden administration, they have announced a new PPP loan which was named a second draw PPP loan. This time, it was easier than before, because those who received the first one had to show their sales reduced by 25% in any quarter from 2019 to 2020.
Also, with the new proposal, everyone who received a $600 stimulus package will receive another $1,400. Unemployed persons will receive $300 per week as well. Pandemic Unemployment Assistance has been extended to 57 weeks. However, the majority of unemployed persons are not looking for a job, as they are happy with the good amount of money coming from the stimulus. If they are working, they would have received less with their full time working salary.
As I’ve heard, the stimulus money is really a loan in advance (without signature on a document).
Have a wonderful week.
I’ll talk to you next week.
