05 August 2020
The Trump administration and Democrats have not agreed to any "top-line numbers" and remain "trillions of dollars apart" on coronavirus stimulus negotiations, White House chief of staff Mark Meadows said Wednesday.
The state of play: Meadows told reporters, "At this point we’re either going to get serious about negotiating and get an agreement in principle or — I’ve become extremely doubtful that we’ll be able to make a deal if it goes well beyond Friday.”
- Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, who is negotiating on behalf of the White House alongside Meadows, added: "I think we need to see some real compromise on some of the big issues. And if we can reach a compromise on these big issues, I think everything else will fall into place."
- He continued: "If we can't reach an agreement on these mitigations then I don't see us coming to an overall deal. And then we'll have to look at the president taking actions under his executive authority."
What to watch: Trump said at a briefing Wednesday that his administration is "exploring executive actions to provide protections against eviction." Meadows added on CNN that the White House legal team is looking at extending enhanced unemployment benefits via executive order, citing "some of the flexibility we have from the previous CARES Act."
The other side: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who has insisted that the price tag for the next coronavirus relief package should be $3.4 trillion, said on MSNBC Wednesday that the White House does not have the power to extend unemployment benefits via executive order.
- "He may be able to extend the moratorium on evictions," Pelosi said. "But unless you have some money with that — it's helpful but it's not the whole thing."
- "Again, he can't do the money without the Congress of the United States. The power of the purse begins in the House."
Go deeper ... Rand Paul: Republicans should apologize to Obama for complaining about spending
Transcripts show George Floyd told police "I can't breathe" over 20 times
Section2Newly released transcripts of bodycam footage from the Minneapolis Police Department show that George Floyd told officers he could not breathe more than 20 times in the moments leading up to his death.
Why it matters: Floyd's killing sparked a national wave of Black Lives Matter protests and an ongoing reckoning over systemic racism in the United States. The transcripts "offer one the most thorough and dramatic accounts" before Floyd's death, The New York Times writes.
The state of play: The transcripts were released as former officer Thomas Lane seeks to have the charges that he aided in Floyd's death thrown out in court, per the Times. He is one of four officers who have been charged.
- The filings also include a 60-page transcript of an interview with Lane. He said he "felt maybe that something was going on" when asked if he believed that Floyd was having a medical emergency at the time.
What the transcripts say:
- Floyd told the officers he was claustrophobic as they tried to get him into the squad car.
- The transcripts also show Floyd saying, "Momma, I love you. Tell my kids I love them. I'm dead."
- Former officer Derek Chauvin, who had his knee on Floyd's neck for over eight minutes, told Floyd, "Then stop talking, stop yelling, it takes a heck of a lot of oxygen to talk."
Read the transcripts via DocumentCloud.