Biden says next stimulus package should be "a hell of a lot bigger" than $2 trillion CARES Act

The next coronavirus stimulus package should be even larger than last month's $2 trillion CARES Act, Joe Biden told Politico during a recent interview.

The former vice president and presumptive 2020 Democratic presidential nominee said that the stimulus should be "a hell of a lot bigger" than the CARES Act and that it should provide money for states and cities so they can avoid "laying off a hell of a lot of teachers and cops and firefighters." 

He wants the next package to include a “trillion-dollar infrastructure program that can be implemented really rapidly,” and he spoke of "dealing with environmental things that create good-paying jobs.”

While the CARES Act approved more than $2 trillion, the Congressional Budget Office and staff of the Joint Committee on Taxation preliminarily estimated that it will cause federal deficits to rise by approximately $1.8 trillion during 2020-2030.

Biden contrasted his handling of the $800 billion Obama-era Recovery Act stimulus with Trump's handling of the current situation, noting that while Biden had selected Earl Devaney to monitor the 2009 Recovery Act, Trump removed Pentagon Inspector General Michael Atkinson, who had been slated to head stimulus oversight efforts.

“I wanted to bring in the toughest son-of-a-bitch in the country—I really mean it, I’m not joking—because we wanted to make sure we did it by the numbers with genuine oversight,” Biden said. “Right now, there’s no oversight. [Trump] made it real clear he doesn’t have any damn interest in being checked. The last thing he wants is anyone watching that $500 billion going to corporate America, for God’s sake.”

Atkinson provided Congress with the whistleblower report regarding Trump's phone call with the Ukrainian president. "He took a fake report and brought it to Congress, with an emergency. Okay? Not a big Trump fan—that, I can tell you," President Trump previously said.

Politico noted that during Biden's interview the former vice president engaged in "hard-to-follow tangents" and a "brief coughing interruption."

"Biden has loved talking about stimulus ever since he ran the Recovery Act, and he sounded comfortable returning to the topic from his Delaware home, although there were a couple of typically hard-to-follow tangents, and one brief coughing interruption that he attributed to swallowing a peanut the wrong way," the outlet noted.

Biden is expected to secure the Democratic presidential nomination, and face off against President Trump during the 2020 general election.