After months of sitting on his hands, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has finally released a proposal for COVID-19 relief. The package is called the HEALS Act, but unfortunately this poorly named bill will heal nothing and will only hurt working people and our families.

The relief package proposed by McConnell on July 27 is $2 trillion short and 73 days late. The bill drastically reduces the $600 in weekly unemployment benefits that thousands of America’s families are relying on right now. While the HEROES Act requires an emergency OSHA standard, McConnell’s proposal does nothing to keep workers safe and instead only protects corporations from liability. And during a time when millions of working people are without a job, health care or retirement security, the package also includes a bill from Sen. Mitt Romney that fast-tracks Social Security and Medicare cuts.

Since May, the HEROES Act – which would provide relief to frontline workers and to working families amid the COVID-19 crisis – has sat untouched on Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s desk. The protection of millions of retirees' and would-be retirees’ pension plans hangs in the balance as Sen. McConnell refuses to take up this important legislation, and endangers a lifetime of sacrifices from working people who deferred compensation in service of retirement security.

Sen. McConnell’s immoral strategy – to delay, obstruct and minimize relief for working families – must fail.

Social distancing and other precautions against COVID-19 will soon be mandatory in workplaces around Virginia under emergency pandemic safety regulations finalized Wednesday.

The new rules, proposed by Gov. Ralph Northam and adopted by the state’s Safety and Health Codes Board over strenuous objections from business groups, make Virginia the first state in the country to pass comprehensive safety rules for employers.