Strategic Stalling: How Nancy Pelosi Turned the Tables on Republicans over Coronavirus

Nancy Pelosi and the Democratic Party at large have a fail-proof strategy at play in Congress right now. If the Republicans act in compliance with it, she wins. If the Republicans don't, she also wins. If they stall? All the worse for them. The key to this has been turning the tables on what looked to be Republicans winning the public relations war over coronavirus by stonewalling the Senate Republican (though largely bipartisan) relief bill unless they agree to a variant plan the Democrats have put forward in the house. The variant bill is largely the same as the bill proposed in the Senate in regards to the coronavirus handling, with slight increases of 10-20% in cash across the board, but they stand out in one certain way: the bill has a tremendous amount of rider policies in it. That is to say policies with no correlation to the subject matter of the bill - coronavirus relief.

Pelosi earlier this year speaking on Coronavirus.

Pelosi has included emission caps on airlines, tax credits to wind and solar farms, barring corporations from lobbying to the federal government entirely, and omission of a clause ordering payroll tax suspension in order to pay for an expansion to the Affordable Care Act's functionality. These things are naturally unacceptable to Republicans across the aisle, and Pelosi knows this. But she has them backed into a corner, all of which works on the axiom that any and all crisis reflects on the ruling government - which leaves her quasi-invulnerable. The Republicans have two choices:

1. Give in to the demands of the Democratic Relief Plan.

2. Refuse to pass the Democratic Relief Plan and settle into a waiting game.

This is bad news for the GOP. If they give in to the Dem Relief Plan, Pelosi and the DNC at large get to claim a political victory - after all, they will have accomplished a great many of their agenda's in one fell swoop. If the GOP refuses to pass it? All the better. It almost certainly delivers a Biden victory in 2020, as the failures of congress to act on #coronavirus will reflect poorly on the Trump Administration as the pandemic worsens. In the words of Obama's Chief of Staff: "You never let a serious crisis go to waste."

It may be Machiavellian, it may politicise the pandemic, but it serves to ensure solid Democrat success this November - for better, or worse.