Trump says will block evictions of American renters

WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump on Thursday said he will use executive powers to extend a moratorium on evictions of Americans struggling during the coronavirus-induced economic slowdown.

"I'm going to, yeah, I'm going to," he told conservative broadcaster Geraldo Rivero in a WTAM 1100 radio interview. "I will be doing it on evictions."

Trump, down in the polls against Democrat presidential challenger Joe Biden, has been signalling for days that he could take unilateral action on prolonging the current evictions relief and also extending enhanced unemployment benefits.

This is in response to continued failure by his Republican party and the Democrats in Congress to come up with a new overall aid package.

Congress has spent weeks tussling over an approximately $1 trillion proposal from the Republican-controlled Senate and a more than $3 billion package put forward by the Democrats in the House of Representatives.

Trump is proposing to use his presidential authority to extend both the temporary evictions protections and the extra money for the unemployed that were provided in an earlier stimulus package, known as the CARES act. Both items have now expired.

Republicans in Congress have insisted on reducing the additional unemployment funds to $200 a week, while Democrats want to keep to previous level of $600.

It is not clear how much authority Trump has, with Congress controlling the budget, but the president is keen to ramp up his use of executive orders ahead of the November election.

Polls show a large majority of Americans do not approve of his handling of the coronavirus pandemic and the badly damaged economy has robbed him of his central reelection campaign theme.

On Wednesday, White House chief of staff Mark Meadows said that Trump would act on Friday "if we haven't made significant progress and we're just too far apart."

"The good news for your viewers is if Congress can't get it done, the president of the United States will," he told CNN.