美国国家公共电台 NPR 历时9个月 美国会终于达成9000亿美元新冠疫情救济法案

After months of failed talks, Congress and the White House have finally reached a deal to provide a fresh round of COVID relief totaling around $900 billion. Congress is now working to pass it and get it to President Trump's desk by Christmas. The deal is attached to the massive $1.4 trillion annual spending bill that funds the government. NPR congressional correspondent Susan Davis is following the negotiations¹ and joins us with the latest. Hi, Sue.

历经数月的谈判失败之后，国会和白宫终于达成协议，将提供总额约9000亿美元的新一轮援助。国会正在努力通过这项法案，并在圣诞节前将其送到特朗普总统的办公桌上。这项协议附在为政府提供资金的1.4万亿美元年度支出法案之后。NPR新闻驻国会记者苏珊·戴维斯一直在关注这些谈判，下面她将带来最新消息。你好，苏。

SUSAN DAVIS, BYLINE²: Hey, Ari.

苏珊·戴维斯连线：你好，阿里。

SHAPIRO: There are thousands of pages in this bill.

夏皮罗：这项法案有数千页。

DAVIS: (Laughter).

戴维斯：（笑声）。

SHAPIRO: What are the most important things that people should know about?

夏皮罗：人们应该知道的最重要事情是什么？

DAVIS: Nearly 6,000 pages in this bill. There's a lot of stuff in here that's...

戴维斯：这项法案有将近6000页。里面包含很多内容。

SHAPIRO: To be exact.

夏皮罗：准确来说。

DAVIS: Yeah, exactly. There's a lot of stuff in here that's going to affect millions of people. But just some of the major highlights — it's going to extend expiring unemployment benefits by up to $300 a week into early spring. It's going to send out another round of those stimulus³ checks to the tune⁴ of $600 for every adult and child, up to certain income thresholds. And there's billions more for food stamp programs. There's another $300 million coming for the Paycheck Protection Program, which is that popular program that has boosted businesses all over the country this year. There's billions in there to get the vaccine⁵ out all across the country.

戴维斯：没错。法案中的很多内容会对数百万人产生影响。但主要亮点之一是，法案将即到期的失业救济金延长至明年初春，每周为美国人提供300美元补助。法案还将启动另一轮刺激计划，为特定收入门槛下的每名成人和儿童提供600美元。法案中还包括数十亿美元的食物券计划。另外还有3亿美元将用于工资保障计划，这个备受欢迎的计划今年推动了全美各地的企业发展。法案中还有数十亿美元资金将用于把疫苗运送到美国各地。

And all in this year, Congress has authorized⁶ about $3.5 trillion in pandemic-related relief. And there's more on the way. President-elect Joe Biden is going to ask for another round of stimulus in the early days of his administration.

今年以来，国会已经批准了约3.5万亿美元涉及疫情的救济资金。未来还将批准更多资金。当选总统乔·拜登将在其执政初期要求启动新一轮刺激计划。

SHAPIRO: There's also something in this bill that we've been hearing about since long before the pandemic — an end to surprise medical billing. What does that mean?

夏皮罗：这项法案中还有我们早在疫情爆发前就听说过的内容，即终结令人震惊的医疗账单。这是什么意思？

DAVIS: Yeah, this kind of just popped up in the final text, but it's a bill that's been trying to get through Congress for years. Essentially⁷, when someone shows up at an in-network hospital or a health care facility, when they have insurance, they can be treated by a doctor who's outside of their network without ever even knowing it, and then they get hit with a big bill. It happens to a lot of people. This would essentially end that practice. It would require health care providers and insurers to negotiate over the prices and leave the patient out of it. It's very popular. It has been championed by Lamar Alexander. He's a Republican of Tennessee, and he's retiring this year. So he gets a big win on his way out the door.

戴维斯：对，这部分内容出现在最终文本中，但这是一项多年来一直试图让国会通过的法案。基本上来说，人们去网络内的医院或医疗机构看病时，如果他们有保险，那就可能在不知情的情况下由网络外的医生来治疗，之后他们会收到巨额账单。很多人都遇到过这种情况。而法案中的新条款将终结这种做法。法案将要求医疗保健提供者和保险公司就价格进行谈判，患者不用参与其中。这项规定非常受欢迎。它得到了拉马尔·亚历山大的拥护。亚历山大是田纳西州的共和党人士，将于今年退休。可以说，他在即将离职时取得了一场大胜。

SHAPIRO: So much in this bill is very popular. A lot of it has bipartisan support. So why did it take seven months of negotiations to get it done?

夏皮罗：这项法案中有很多受欢迎的条款。其中很多都得到了两党的支持。那为何法案历经7个月的谈判才得以达成？

DAVIS: You know, leadership really messed this up. This has not been a tale of great political management. Speaker Nancy Pelosi for months refused to agree to anything less than $2 trillion. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell at the same time drew a red line that he would not bring any bill to the floor that didn't include liability protections for coronavirus-related lawsuits⁸.

戴维斯：将事情搞砸的是两党的领袖。这并不是一个伟大的政治管理故事。众议院议长南希·佩洛西数月来一直拒绝同意任何低于2万亿美元的方案。与此同时，参议院多数党领袖米奇·麦康奈尔也划定了一条红线，即他不会提出任何不包括冠状病毒相关诉讼责任保护的法案。

In the end, they didn't get either one of those things. There had been this sort of uprising after the election from centrists in the House and Senate who just kind of had it with leadership's inability to get this done. And they assembled the top lines of this deal, what they would vote for and sort of forced leadership in the past couple of weeks to hammer out the details. Pelosi on the floor today described herself as heartbroken about this bill and where it ended up, but it was literally⁹ the best they could do.

最后，他们两个都没有得到自已想要的。参众两院的中立议员改选后引发了混乱，他们因为领导层能力差而无法完成这项任务。过去几周，他们制定了这项协议的主要内容，确定了投票支持的条款，并在某种程度上迫使领导层敲定细节。佩洛西今天在国会表示，这项法案及其最终结果令她感到心碎，但这确实是他们能达成的最好协议。

SHAPIRO: Does the long, difficult road that this bill had to take forecast anything about what's to come in the new year?

夏皮罗：这项法案所走的漫长而艰难的道路是否对明年有所预示？

DAVIS: I think it really could. You know, President-elect Biden has his work cut out for him when it comes to mending these congressional relationships. He says he can. He says he knows how to reach across the aisle¹⁰ and get deals. I think it's fair to say the relationship between these top leaders in Congress is terrible right now. You know, Mitch McConnell and Minority Leader Chuck Schumer have been at odds¹¹ for months. They've often been trading insults on the Senate floor. Here was Chuck Schumer just this morning.

戴维斯：我认为的确可以。就修复这些国会关系而言，当选总统拜登面临重重困难。他说他可以做到。他表示，他知道如何跨越两党之间的分歧并达成协议。我认为公平来说，这些国会最高领袖之间的关系现在很糟糕。米奇·麦康奈尔和少数派领袖查克·舒默已经不和数个月了。二人经常在参议院对骂。以下是查克·舒默今天早上所说。

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

（录音档案）

CHUCK SCHUMER: The Republican leader's accusation¹² that the blame for this bill's delay lies totally on one side is just ridiculous. It's "Alice In Wonderland" thinking. It defies all the facts as to what we have seen.

查克·舒默：共和党领袖将这项法案的拖延完全归咎于一方，这种说法真是太荒谬了。这是“爱丽丝梦游仙境”的想法。这与我们所看到的所有事实相悖。

DAVIS: Then throw into this Pelosi and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy. They have very little regard for each other. McCarthy would very much like to take the speaker's gavel from her in the next election. It's a pretty bitter end to this Congress, and it does set the stage for what could be very difficult negotiations with Biden and especially congressional Republicans, who have been increasingly resistant¹³ to agreeing to any kind of new spending and have signaled that they might not be willing to go along in the new year, either.

戴维斯：佩洛西和众议院少数党领袖凯文·麦卡锡也要算进去。二人很少顾及对方。麦卡锡非常希望在下次选举中夺走议长的权杖。这是本届国会相当痛苦的结局，这意味着拜登和国会共和党人之间的谈判将会非常艰难，后者越来越不愿意同意任何形式的新支出，他们还暗示新的一年他们可能也不愿意同意。

SHAPIRO: That's NPR congressional correspondent Susan Davis. Thanks, Sue.

夏皮罗：以上是NPR新闻驻国会记者苏珊·戴维斯带来的报道。谢谢你，苏。

DAVIS: You're welcome.

戴维斯：不客气。

1 negotiations   

协商( negotiation的名词复数 )； 谈判； 完成（难事）； 通过

参考例句：

• negotiations for a durable peace 为持久和平而进行的谈判
• Negotiations have failed to establish any middle ground. 谈判未能达成任何妥协。

2 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

3 stimulus   

n.刺激，刺激物，促进因素，引起兴奋的事物

参考例句：

• Regard each failure as a stimulus to further efforts.把每次失利看成对进一步努力的激励。
• Light is a stimulus to growth in plants.光是促进植物生长的一个因素。

4 tune   

n.调子；和谐，协调；v.调音，调节，调整

参考例句：

• He'd written a tune,and played it to us on the piano.他写了一段曲子，并在钢琴上弹给我们听。
• The boy beat out a tune on a tin can.那男孩在易拉罐上敲出一首曲子。

5 vaccine   

n.牛痘苗，疫苗；adj.牛痘的，疫苗的

参考例句：

• The polio vaccine has saved millions of lives.脊髓灰质炎疫苗挽救了数以百万计的生命。
• She takes a vaccine against influenza every fall.她每年秋季接种流感疫苗。

6 authorized   

a.委任的，许可的

参考例句：

• An administrative order is valid if authorized by a statute.如果一个行政命令得到一个法规的认可那么这个命令就是有效的。

7 essentially   

adv.本质上，实质上，基本上

参考例句：

• Really great men are essentially modest.真正的伟人大都很谦虚。
• She is an essentially selfish person.她本质上是个自私自利的人。

8 lawsuits   

n.诉讼( lawsuit的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Lawsuits involving property rights and farming and grazing rights increased markedly. 涉及财产权，耕作与放牧权的诉讼案件显著地增加。 来自辞典例句
• I've lost and won more lawsuits than any man in England. 全英国的人算我官司打得最多，赢的也多，输的也多。 来自辞典例句

9 literally   

adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实

参考例句：

• He translated the passage literally.他逐字逐句地翻译这段文字。
• Sometimes she would not sit down till she was literally faint.有时候，她不走到真正要昏厥了，决不肯坐下来。

10 aisle   

n.（教堂、教室、戏院等里的）过道，通道

参考例句：

• The aisle was crammed with people.过道上挤满了人。
• The girl ushered me along the aisle to my seat.引座小姐带领我沿着通道到我的座位上去。

11 odds   

n.让步，机率，可能性，比率；胜败优劣之别

参考例句：

• The odds are 5 to 1 that she will win.她获胜的机会是五比一。
• Do you know the odds of winning the lottery once?你知道赢得一次彩票的几率多大吗？

12 accusation   

n.控告，指责，谴责

参考例句：

• I was furious at his making such an accusation.我对他的这种责备非常气愤。
• She knew that no one would believe her accusation.她知道没人会相信她的指控。

13 resistant   

adj.(to)抵抗的，有抵抗力的

参考例句：

• Many pests are resistant to the insecticide.许多害虫对这种杀虫剂有抵抗力。
• They imposed their government by force on the resistant population.他们以武力把自己的统治强加在持反抗态度的人民头上。