SOUTH JERSEY (KYW Newsradio) — If President Donald Trump wants a bigger COVID-19 relief package, New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy is all for it.
“If the president thinks we should be going to $2,000, count me in. I’ll go with him and say that we need more,” he said Wednesday in Toms River, where health care workers were getting the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine.
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He’s grateful but says the $900 billion stimulus package isn’t enough. And “if the president is saying he wants more, I want more too.”
Murphy said state revenues have plummeted and expenses have skyrocketed during the pandemic, so more state and local stimulus cash is essential.
“I think we need to ask the president respectfully to sign this, and then come back for something very quickly thereafter with a bigger amount,” he suggested.
Democratic U.S. Rep. Andy Kim from New Jersey, who also attended the Toms River event, questioned why the president wasn’t more involved in the stimulus talks.
“It has been very, very clear when it came to these past negotiations that he just wasn't a part of it,” he said. “So for him to now chime in here and talk about this and try to potentially threaten a veto or something of that nature against this, it’s just showing how poorly we are being led right now at the federal level.”
Still, Kim said he would support a larger stimulus bill.
“The president wants to push that forward and have a higher amount — I’m all for that. I’m ready to vote today on something like that.”