In the early hours of Saturday morning, Congressman Henry Cuellar (TX-28) presided over the House of Representatives as the House debated and voted on President Joe Biden’s bid for the $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief bill known as the American Rescue Plan.

The congressman shed light on the bill and what he expects will ultimately be left on it as the Senate takes it up next week for negotiations and a vote. Cuellar detailed how much money is expected for each county and city in Texas and what he hopes the new relief bill helps achieve in the wake of a pandemic that for a year has impacted the physical and financial health of people.

“We passed the bill and it’s going to go to the Senate, and there will be some adjustments in the Senate and then it will be sent back to us, and if everything is fine, then we will pass it to the White House for signature some time before March 15,” Cuellar said.

According to Cuellar, the bill is expected to bring much more aid to the local area both in federal funds being redirected to the cities and also extra incentives for the places hit hardest by the pandemic. That includes places such as downtown Laredo businesses that have suffered immensely from border restrictions put in place for almost a year as the border has been partially closed since March 21, 2020.

“There is an extra $15 billion that are targeted to those areas that have been really hit hard that will include the border because of the Mexican shoppers not being around, which I will talk about next week,” Cuellar said. “Our goal is to fix and balance the health of the individual and the health of the economy. By the health of the individual, we want to make sure that we get more vaccines as you know we are going to start seeing more vaccines by April and May, and the other thing is to give help to the economy by helping small businesses and providing stimulus checks for people to pay everyday bills they might have.”

Cuellar said he will soon be working on another letter to send to the president’s administration in conjunction with other representatives from the southern and northern borders to make sure border restrictions are once again reconsidered as cases involving COVID-19 seem to be going down in the areas most impacted. However, he hopes the passed American Rescue Plan helps quickly bring aid to these areas as these policy moves would be done in the coming weeks and months.

The bill also intends to provide federal funds directly to the states and cities and counties as well, so all of the areas of Cuellar’s districts are covered under the new relief package.

Next week, Cuellar will make an announcement about how much each county and city he serves would get under the American Rescue Plan. He said Texas is slated to receive about $27 billion, and $10 billion of it will go to counties and cities. Although the numbers may change, Cuellar estimates Webb County will receive $54 million. Zapata would get $3 million, Laredo would get $96 million and Rio Bravo would get a little over $1 million.

As the bill passed with a thin margin of 219 to 212 votes with some Democrats even joining with Republicans in opposing it, Cuellar said the bill will not pass as it currently stands because of the continued debate about the minimum wage being raised to $15.

“The Senate parliamentary ruled on Thursday that minimum wage was not going to be included, so the House version will be changed on that, and there will probably be other changes, but pretty much the Senate will work on this next week and then we will probably vote on it not next week but the following week so we can pair it off to the president,” Cuellar said.

However, the major provisions regarding COVID-19 relief will stay. The things that will remain in the bill no matter the changes include stimulus checks, expanding the child tax credit, funds for COVID-19 testing, contact tracing and vaccine distribution efforts, funds to help open up public schools safely, funds to open colleges and universities, funds to expand internet access, continued unemployment benefits, subsides to help with the Affordable Care Act and funds and incentives for the Medicaid expansion program. Cuellar said the state could get large amounts of money if it allows the expansion.

Cuellar said this might be one of the largest relief bills passed by congress in terms of trying to help bring aid to areas hit hardest economically by the pandemic.

“We don’t know; hopefully, the economy will start opening a lot more, but this is probably one of the larger ones that we got,” Cuellar said.

During the vote that extended into the early hours of Saturday, Cuellar had the privilege of presiding over the House of Representatives as speaker pro temp. He said it was a great honor to play that role as part of such a historic vote.

“I have been asked to do this more and more every day I think, and for big bills they usually call me up to do the big bills because I have been doing this for many years, so I certainly want to thank Speaker (Nancy) Pelosi for giving me that honor,” Cuellar said. “Last night I tried to preside fairly and with the least drama possible as when there is no drama, then that means that the work is being done. We got it done last night, and it is an honor to work on this, especially when you know that you are working on the biggest bills around at $1.9 trillion.”

On what was already a late night, serving as speaker pro temp meant an even later night for Cuellar as the presiding congressman must stay until the full vote is finished. They finished around 2 a.m., and Cuellar was back at work Saturday morning.

“We are hoping that this will be extremely helpful to the individuals and businesses so we can see some sort of normal times and get people back on their feet, and we are hoping that towards the end of the year that we will start seeing some sort of normalcy,” Cuellar said.