Mitch McConnell can’t rewrite the record on Covid negotiations

And Chuck Schumer isn’t letting him, writes US political correspondent Griffin Connolly

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is pretending that Monday’s Covid package is always what Republicans have wanted. It’s not. (Getty Images)

As Congress prepared to vote on an historic $900bn coronavirus stimulus package on Monday, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell took to the podium to rewrite the history on how that deal took shape.

“Senate Republicans have been trying since July — July — to get more targeted bipartisan relief into the hands of the American people,” he said.

The Kentucky Republican pointed to a $1trn bill he and the GOP majority first offered this summer that included a second round of stimulus checks, reauthorisation of key lending programmes for small- and medium-sized businesses, and billions of additional dollars to boost testing to help get children back to in-person schooling for the fall.