Rubio accuses Democrats of holding Coronavirus funding hostage

Transmitting from his ficus bush-protected family bunker in West Miami, Florida, Senator Marco Rubio (R) taped and shared a video on Twitter slamming Senate Democrats for blocking a $250 billion supplemental funding bill for the Payment Protection Program, or PPP.  They “decided to take the program hostage,” said Rubio.

Rubio further explained that Senate Democratic leadership took the program “hostage as leverage for unrelated items." He specified to viewers that he's "not telling you the things they’re talking about are not legitimate. That we should provide more money for smaller cities – we’ve all got smaller cities in our states. That we should provide more money for our hospitals… Not that they’re unimportant, but this is something that we know… we need to plug right now because the program’s gonna run out of money, not in five weeks, not in three weeks, right away.”

For him, “This is not a time to take things hostage. This is also not a time for political horse-trading. PPP is not a Republican ask. It’s not a GOP priority. It is a national priority. It is the most bipartisan, widely supported program in the bill.”

As referenced earlier in the week by Florida Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell (D), Democrats are worried that those that need the money will not be receiving it, which Senator Rubio expressed is why some have “heard some talk today about, ‘well, people that are not banking are being locked out.’”

Looking to clarify the concern, the Florida lawmaker said, "part of the reason is because they think we’re gonna not run out of money, so there’s a crush. And the other reason has nothing to do with the law."

"It has nothing to do with any of the changes that they want made," said Rubio "It has to do with the fact that we need to open doors for more non-bank lenders and community banks to come in. And those are technical changes that are being made by the agencies, and they’re already happening. They know they’re already happening. So, when this time comes next week, if things don’t change, and people get locked out, you will know it was because of the actions that were taken today that make absolutely no sense.”