As promised, here’s a quick thread fact-checking the many claims Secretary Mnuchin made this week to justify his decision to end the CARES Act lending programs before the Biden Administration could use them.

The bottom line is that the Secretary’s case really doesn’t hold up. 1/

Sec. Mnuchin claims the CARES Act terminates all new Fed lending on 12/31/20.
 
Nope. It clearly says that while Treasury can’t make a new investment in a Fed program after that date, the Fed can keep making loans after year-end. That was in fact Treasury’s view pre-election. 2/

Mnuchin: If the programs don’t terminate at year-end, that would mean I could use this money to make loans forever, and that’s crazy!

Nope. Section 4027 of the CARES Act says Treasury can’t use the money after 2026. Congress clearly set an end date and Mnuchin ignored it. 3/

Mnuchin: Ending these programs didn’t matter because they weren’t helping much.
 
That’s because you designed them poorly! A Biden Treasury could have made them better. It takes real guts to use your own bad design as an excuse to end the programs before they could be fixed. 4/

Mnuchin: This was not a political decision because I extended non-CARES Act lending facilities.

(1) You just so happened to decide the law required you to terminate the CARES facilities after Biden won the election.

(2) The programs you extended mainly helped Wall Street. 5/

Secretary Mnuchin’s misinterpretation of the CARES Act is not binding on the next Administration.

The incoming Treasury team should follow the text of the CARES Act and revive and restock these facilities to help small businesses and municipal governments. END