House Representatives on Wednesday voted to pass the Covid relief bill known as the American Rescue Plan by a vote of 220 to 211. The Senate had passed the $1.9 trillion bill on Saturday. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer told his colleagues during the debate, “I expect zero Republicans to vote for this bill,” a good prediction given that no Senate Republicans voted for it. Seven weeks into his Presidency Joe Biden is expected to sign the landmark bill into law. A Pew Research poll found that a whopping 70% of Americans say they are in favor of it and only a third feel it is too big. One quarter say it doesn’t go far enough. The poll also found that a majority of Americans feel Biden made a good faith effort to try to include Republicans. A CNN poll released on the same day found similar public support for the American Rescue Plan with a majority backing various aspects of the bill that pour money into needed programs like schools, child tax credits and stimulus checks. 

In other news the House on Tuesday passed a sweeping pro-union bill to reform labor laws called the Protecting the Right to Organize or PRO Act. It was the second time the House passed the bill, having first voted on it a year ago. But the bill languished in the Republican-controlled Senate. Now, as a critically important union vote at an Amazon warehouse in Alabama is taking place, the PRO bill enables, among other things, for contract workers to have the right to join unions. It would also undermine state-level so-called “Right to Work” laws that Republicans have used to try to decimate union dues. Five Republicans voted for the PRO act alongside yes votes from all but one Democrat. President Biden tweeted his support for the bill saying, “I believe every worker deserves a free and fair choice to join a union — and the PRO Act will bring us closer to that reality. I urge Congress to send it to my desk so we can summon a new wave of worker power and create an economy that works for everyone.” 

In news from the coronavirus pandemic, which is now officially a year old, Biden says he plans to secure an additional 100 million doses of Johnson and Johnson’s vaccine. According to the New York Times, “officials said that they expected the doses to be delivered sometime in the second half of this year.” The good news is that scientists are optimistic about how well vaccines are working so far. One immunologist Jeremy Kamil told NBC News, “This virus is not invincible, and despite all these variants, the vaccines are working great.” He added, “There are certain variants that are more transmissible, and we have strong data on that, but the thing people should take away from the variant story is just: Don’t let your guard down.” He was referring to several states relaxing their quarantine rules before most Americans have been vaccinated. The slow roll out of the vaccines are partly a result of high demand with low supplies,