Rubio drafts $300 billion plan to keep workers employed during coronavirus pandemic

Florida Republican Sen. Marco Rubio’s plan to provide $300 billion in emergency loans to small businesses — loans that will be forgiven if businesses keep their workers employed during the coronavirus pandemic — is included in draft legislation of a massive coronavirus relief bill that could pass the U.S. Senate as early as Monday.

Rubio, along Republican Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, were put in charge of a small business emergency economic relief plan by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.

Rubio’s ideas, which have been in the works for weeks as the coronavirus threat grew, were officially unveiled on Thursday evening.

The U.S. Senate is negotiating a $1 trillion coronavirus relief bill and McConnell hopes to reach a final agreement Friday evening. The package will need at least 60 senators to vote in favor, meaning it will need the support of both Democrats and Republicans as the GOP only controls 53 votes in the 100 member Senate.

Democrats and some Republicans have criticized parts of the massive plan, including corporate bailouts and smaller cash payments to low-income Americans who pay little to no taxes.

“Sen. McConnell’s bill is not pro worker at all. It puts corporations ahead of people,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said Friday morning.

Democrats also want to add an expanded paid sick leave program to the bill and cancel student loan debt.

But the small business portion of the plan has largely evaded harsh criticism.

The plan would allow businesses that employ fewer than 500 employees to apply for loans through existing Small Business Administration-certified lenders, including banks and credit unions.

The maximum loan amount would be $10 million and if the small business owner uses the funds to keep workers on the payroll between March 1 and June 30, 2020, the loan would be forgiven. And employers who rely on tipped workers, like many bars and restaurants, would receive forgiveness for additional wages paid during the next three months to make up for the lack of tips during government-mandated closures.

“The economic uncertainty and potential global impact we are facing due to the coronavirus pandemic are unprecedented,” Rubio said in a statement. “America’s more than 30 million small businesses — and the 59.9 million individuals they employ — today face the prospect of going bankrupt. They face this threat due to no fault of their own, but because of a global pandemic that takes human lives and grinds productivity to a halt. Congress must set aside our normal procedural and partisan games to act without delay.”

The small business plan also expands the allowable uses of existing federal small business loans to include meeting payroll, paid sick leave, supply chain disruptions, salaries, mortgage payments and debt obligation, and allows business owners to get the money quickly.

The plan is retroactive to March 1, 2020, allowing small business owners who have already laid off employees due to the coronavirus to receive benefits if they hire back their workers.

“Support for small businesses is one of the four key components of the much bigger proposal we are finalizing,” McConnell said Thursday on the Senate floor. “Chairman Rubio and Chairman Collins have been crafting a major plan to help small businesses survive this process and help workers continue to get paid.”

Rubio said Friday that helping small businesses specifically is important because they don’t have access to the same lines of credit as large corporations.

“They don’t have a few weeks before they run out of operating cash. They are (often tearfully) laying off workers all over the country, by the minute because they have no choice,” Rubio tweeted Friday. “Small/mid-size business owners are also employees themselves. The trauma this is inflicting on them, their employees and our country is severe. We don’t have the luxury of days to kick around ideas or try to one-up each other. We need to reach agreement and act now.”

This story was originally published March 20, 2020 at 2:17 PM.