Report: Biden Won’t Veto GOP’s COVID Emergency End Bill

President Joe Biden told Democrat leaders that he would not veto a Republican-led bill to immediately end the national COVID-19 emergency, in place for more than two years.

The Hill reported a Democrat source said Senate Majority Leader Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., told Democrat senators Wednesday that Biden decided not use his ability to veto legislation to stop a GOP bill immediately ending the COVID emergency instead of letting it expire in May.

“Today, we are in a different phase of the response to that pandemic than we were in March of 2020, and my Administration is planning for an end to the national emergency, but an orderly transition is critical to the health and safety of the nation,” Biden said in a statement renewing the emergency in February. “For this reason, the national emergency declared on March 13, 2020, and beginning March 1, 2020, must continue in effect beyond March 1, 2023. Therefore, in accordance with section 202(d) of the National Emergencies Act (50 U.S.C. 1622(d)), I am continuing the national emergency declared in Proclamation 9994 concerning the COVID-19 pandemic. I anticipate terminating the national emergency concerning the COVID-19 pandemic on May 11, 2023.”

Former President Donald Trump made the declaration in March 2020, at the onset of the pandemic, and it has been extended 13 times since then, according to the Department of Health and Human Services.

The declaration allowed the federal government flexibility in making medical care available and cover the cost of treatment for the disease, it also allowed government funded healthcare through Medicare and Medicaid to expand in certain areas to battle the pandemic, the Kaiser Family Foundation reported in January.

Rather than waiting for May, House Republicans used their new majority to pass legislation in January to end the emergency, U.S. News and World Report said in a Jan. 31 report.

“Rather than waiting until May 11, the Biden Administration should join us now in immediately ending this declaration,” House Majority Leader Rep. Steve Scalise, R-La., Louisiana said in a statement at the time. “House Republicans are making it clear that the days of the Biden Administration being able to hide behind COVID to waste billions of taxpayer dollars on their unrelated, radical agenda are over.”

According to The Hill’s report Wednesday, Biden’s decision to approve the bill once it gets through the Senate will likely free up some Democrats in that chamber to support the plan.