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Trump blames stimulus delay on Democratic push for mail-in votes

As a confirmed stimulus deal has lagged behind the expected deadline, President Trump has said he believes the delay comes from the Democratic Party pushing for funding for mail-in voting, and has vowed to block funding for it. Yahoo Finance’s Jess Smith and Rick Newman join The Final Round to discuss the details.

Video Transcript

SEANA SMITH: Welcome back. Well, President Trump's reiterating this morning that the main reason stimulus talks have stalled at this point is over the additional funding for the post office. And of course, that surrounds the mail-in voting. So Jess Smith is standing by for us with the latest from DC. Jess.

JESS SMITH: Yeah, Seana. Things are not looking good for a stimulus deal. I know I've said that several times, but really, they're not looking good today.

The Senate just adjourned until September 8. So Majority Leader Mitch McConnell says that he'll call senators back, give them 24 hours' notice if there is a deal, but at this point, that does not look likely. And the House had already left under those same conditions. So now people have left DC. Negotiators aren't meeting.

And then, today, what President Trump said in a Fox interview really probably hurt negotiations and made the odds of a deal even slimmer. He said in this Fox interview that one of the sticking points in these negotiations is funding for the United States Postal Service. He says he does not want that funding to go through, because it would be used to facilitate mail-in voting. He went on to say, if you don't get the funding, that means you can't have universal mail-in voting. So he has consistently railed against mail-in voting with unproven claims of voter fraud.

Speaker Pelosi responded to that today, saying that he is "afraid of the American people," so he's putting up obstacles to keep them from participating in the election. But even aside from that massive issue that has come up now, there are many, many differences between the two sides in these negotiations. Speaker Pelosi outlined them again today, saying they're just vast differences.

She spoke to Treasury Secretary Mnuchin yesterday and turned down a meeting because, she said, he wasn't budging. She wants him to come to $2 trillion. So far, the administration has said no. So we will watch for any movement, but at this point, it is still not looking good.

SEANA SMITH: It certainly is not looking good. Jess, thanks for that update.

Rick, I'd love to get your thoughts, because yesterday we talked about this. You said yesterday, don't expect anything until the fall, into September. But I just wanted to get your thoughts just on this mail-in voting and the funding for the postal service, because I think that this issue just takes this whole thing to another level, because when you take a look at the numbers-- and Jess just said this-- the fraud for mail-in voting is very rare. So it's a baseless argument that he's making.

RICK NEWMAN: Yeah, so think about what this does to the dynamics of these negotiations. So Trump has now basically shown his hand, and he has basically said, here's the reason I'm not agreeing to what the Democrats want, because I will not agree-- and it's two sets of funding for the postal service. One is $25 billion for operations for the postal service, and then the second set of money is about $3.6 billion for states to help them pay for and set up mail-in voting. So call it $28, $29 billion altogether.

So Trump has basically put Nancy Pelosi in a position that, if she gives in on any of those demands, it's gonna look like Trump wins. So guess what's gonna happen? Pelosi is going to demand all of that money end up in a final bill. And now we have a complete impasse.

This is-- this amount of money is small potatoes compared to a bill that is-- where the starting price tag is $1 trillion. It's less than 3% of the total in it. We could get a $2 or $1 and 1/2 trillion bill.

But because Trump has now made this such a crucial issue, the Democrats can't back down. And how in the world is Trump gonna back down at this point? So I think this actually raises the possibility that it scuttles the whole thing. And you could even have Democrats saying, this is another reason to vote for Joe Biden, because once Joe Biden gets in, we'll pass a clean stimulus bill, and we'll get this all done.

ANDY SERWER: You know, Rick, it's interesting, 'cause I know you talked earlier about this being a game of chicken. And when poll numbers start to turn against one party or the other, when it comes to this deadlock, someone will capitulate. I agree, this complicates matters.

But it's interesting to politicize the post office. And you wonder if, you know, this is something that-- I don't know if it's a third rail or something like that where Americans are just gonna say, you know, let the post office be, leave it alone, or-- meaning, fund it. Don't turn this into a political football. But it's so hard to see where this thing goes, I guess, right?

RICK NEWMAN: I mean, I'll give you some context on that, Andy. So recent polling by the Pew Research Center shows 70% of Americans favor mail-in voting for everybody, and that includes 49% of Republicans. So the numbers are higher for independents. And they're in the 80s for Democrats.

And also think about who relies most on the postal service-- probably older Americans. And we're starting to see anecdotal reports now of seniors who get prescription medicine through the mail, and they are not getting that on time. And they're sitting there saying, what is going on in Washington that now I'm not getting my medicine on time?

So I think this is a loser for President Trump. You know, the mail-- it's kind of easy to bash the USPS. But in reality, it's a pretty good deal, and a lot of people rely on it. And I'm not sure Trump is gonna get the traction he thinks he might get on this.

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