Washington (CNN)House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer said Sunday that he spent the weekend in talks with House and Senate members on a coronavirus relief package and signaled he’d be willing to accept a deal that doesn’t include the state and local aid that Democrats have been pushing for in order “to get the essential done.”
“(House Speaker Nancy Pelosi) and I spent a lot of time on the phone together. And I am very hopeful that next week, we will be able to act on substantial relief,” Hoyer told CNN’s Abby Phillip on “Inside Politics.”
Democrats “are not going to get everything we want. We think state and local (aid) is important,” he added. “And if we can get that we want to get it. But we want to get aid out to the people who are really, really struggling and are at grave risk.”
Congress is currently at an impasse regarding a potential relief package, and the comments from Hoyer could mean his party is ready to get behind something that includes less of what they wanted in the legislation. The leader said that it was critical the bill include money for small businesses, vaccine delivery, unemployment and childcare, “all of which are in the agreement that has” been created by a bipartisan group of lawmakers.
“We need to get the essential done. We’ll have time to get stuff done that we didn’t include because we couldn’t get political agreement, we’ll have time to do that,” he told Phillip.
The path forward on the stimulus is as unclear as it has ever been, though congressional aides working on it are hoping that something could shake loose over the weekend. Pelosi has insisted the House could extend its session into Christmas week if necessary.
Later Sunday, two senators said a stimulus bill will be unveiled on Monday.
“We’re going to introduce a bill tomorrow night,” Louisiana Republican Sen. Bill Cassidy told CNN’s Jake Tapper on “State of the Union.” “The leadership can discard it, I can’t govern that.”
“There will be a deal,” he added.
Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia told Fox News that the bipartisan group will release “a complete bill tomorrow before the end of the day.”
Manchin added that negotiations “haven’t fallen apart,” despite concerns on Friday that the group was struggling to finalize a deal. He said the group has been talking over the weekend, and will have another call on Sunday.
CNN’s Ben Geldon, Nicky Robertson, Manu Raju and Lauren Fox contributed to this report.
