NEW: Perdue Begged Trump to Sign Relief Bill to Bail Out His Collapsing Campaign, Failed to Advocate For Direct Stimulus Checks

Bloomberg: Perdue was “concerned” that Trump’s delay of inadequate $600 stimulus checks Perdue touted and Trump criticized would “harm his … prospects” in the runoff

ATLANTA — A Bloomberg report uncovered that the Senate’s “most prolific stock trader” David Perdue tried to “pressure” President Trump to sign the latest coronavirus relief bill in order to help his “prospects” in January’s runoff, and failed to embrace the increased $2,000 stimulus checks Trump and Democrats called for days before. Perdue has repeatedly refused to say whether he would support raising stimulus checks to $2,000.

In keeping with his record of “personally oppos[ing]” direct stimulus checks all year and saying he “held [his] nose” to vote for coronavirus relief, missing from the list of arguments Perdue reportedly made to Trump to sign the COVID relief bill was any size of direct stimulus checks. Senate Republicans only got on board with relief because Perdue was “getting hammered” for Republicans’ failure to deliver more pandemic aid to Americans amid Jon Ossoff’s tough scrutiny on Perdue leading the charge to cut unemployment benefits for families.

“Senator Perdue has no problem making a plea to Trump when he needs his flailing campaign rescued but for the past eight months, as Georgians have been in desperate need of aid, he was nowhere to be found,” said Braxton Brewington, spokesman for the Democratic Party of Georgia. “Georgia voters are done with Perdue’s games of only looking out for himself, that’s why they’re turning out this election to ensure this is Perdue’s last term in Washington.”

Bloomberg: Trump Got Christmas Plea on Aid From Senator Worried by Runoff

• “Georgia Republican Senator David Perdue lobbied Donald Trump last week to sign the pandemic relief bill he’d criticized, concerned that the president’s delay would harm his and Senator Kelly Loeffler’s prospects in the Jan. 5 runoff elections, according to people familiar with the matter.”

• “In a Christmas-Day phone call to Trump, Perdue argued that the bill was vital for unemployment benefits, coronavirus-vaccine distribution and a moratorium on evictions. Perdue also contacted White House allies including National Economic Council director Larry Kudlow and the president’s daughter, Ivanka Trump, to try to pressure the president, the people said.”

• “Perdue and Senator Lindsey Graham, who visited Trump at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida over Christmas, also argued in favor of Trump sending Congress a list of spending items in the bill to eliminate, known as rescissions, after he signed it. Lawmakers are expected to ignore the request.”

• “The people familiar with the matter asked not to be identified because the conversations were private. A spokesman for Perdue’s campaign declined to comment.”

• “Trump grudgingly signed the $2.3 trillion bill late Sunday, a delay that caused a one-week lapse in unemployment benefits for millions of American workers. He has demanded that Congress increase direct payments to Americans to $2,000 each, from $600, and pass legislation eliminating or limiting a liability shield for social media companies that have censored or fact-checked some of Trump’s election-related tweets.”

• “Perdue’s opponent, Democrat Jon Ossoff, has tried to hang Trump’s delay in signing the relief bill around the Republican senator’s neck. Over the weekend, his campaign asked Atlanta TV stations to pull a Perdue ad claiming the senator “delivered” the $908 billion relief package because Trump hadn’t signed it, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.”

• “Ossoff’s campaign noted that Perdue has repeatedly said he opposes direct payments to Americans as part of stimulus measures, as well as expanded unemployment benefits, at one point calling it “an incentive not to come back to work.””

• ““David Perdue hasn’t spent a single second making a public case for his constituents to get direct relief, but when it comes to a Hail Mary to save his collapsing campaign, he’s willing to call the president directly to save himself. Those are his priorities,” an Ossoff spokeswoman, Miryam Lipper, said in a statement.”

• “Perdue hasn’t said whether he would support raising payments under the new relief bill to $2,000, as Trump has demanded. Ossoff has promised to support the $2,000 payments.”

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