Biden wants Congress to take action on gun reform

White House press secretary Jen Psaki said that discussions over who should receive $1,400 stimulus checks as part of the COVID relief package are ongoing, but made it clear that Biden would be unlikely to support any income threshold lower than $60,000.

"So his view is that a nurse, a teacher, a firefighter, who's making $60,000 shouldn't be left without any support or relief either. It's just a question of sort of where the scale up looks like -- what it looks like in a final package, but it's still being negotiated at this point in time," Psaki said.

When pressed on Sen. Bernie Sander's, I-Vt., assessment that it would be "absurd" to lower the threshold on who should receive the $1,400 checks, Psaki declined to answer, but said that once a threshold was found they would be glad to have the discussion. 

Psaki also offered insight into the ongoing negotiations.

"In the last week alone, our legislative affairs team had done more than 300 calls with members and staff on the Hill, including 40 calls with Republicans or bipartisan groups," Psaki said. "And you can expect that the president will engage, throughout the course of this week, with a range of stakeholders including business leaders, mayors and governors."

-ABC News' Molly Nagle

White House press secretary Jen Psaki weighed in on the Democratic proposal to provide between $3,000 and $3,600 in child care tax credits to families, noting in a press briefing Monday that Biden had included a tax credit in his $1.9 trillion COVID relief plan, and supports the proposal put forward by Rep. Richard Neal, D-Mass. 

"(The) president supports the proposal that Rep. Neal and others have put forward to ensure that there is money in the package that helps bring relief to families in the form of a child tax credit." Psaki said. "That’s something he certainly would support.”

But when asked if Biden would seek to make the credit permanent, Psaki indicated that would not be, saying it's "emergency funding that will help people get through this period of time."

-ABC News' Molly Nagle

Former President Donald Trump's legal team filed a 78-page trial brief Monday morning, ahead of the Senate impeachment trial. The brief asks the Senate to dismiss the charges, stating their belief that holding a trial is unconstitutional in the first place and also asserting that Trump was engaging in political speech protected by the First Amendment.

"His political speech falls squarely within the protections of the First Amendment under clear Supreme Court precedent (as fully discussed below), and he thus cannot be convicted by a Senate sworn to uphold the Constitution," Trump's lawyers wrote in the brief.

House impeachment managers promptly filed a five-page response to the brief and called his free speech argument "utterly baseless."

"The evidence of President Trump's conduct is overwhelming. He has no valid excuse or defense for his actions," the impeachment managers wrote. "And his efforts to escape accountability are entirely unavailing."

-ABC News' Katherine Faulders

Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., announced in a statement that he will not seek re-election in 2022.

 "Today I announce that I will not seek a seventh term in the United State Senate in 2022," Shelby says in the statement. "For everything, there is a season."

He cited no specific reason for his decision not to run.

Shelby is currently the vice chairman and leading Republican on the Senate Appropriations Committee, where he recently served as chairman of the full committee and its subcommittee on defense. He previously served as chairman of the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration and the Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee, of which he is the longest serving member in history, according to his statement.

Before being elected to the Senate in 1986, Shelby served four terms in the U.S. House representing Alabama's 7th Congressional District. He also served in the Alabama State Legislature.

"Although I plan to retire, I am not leaving today. I have two good years remaining to continue my work in Washington. I have the vision and the energy to give it my all," he said in his statement.

-ABC News' Allison Pecorin