$2000 Checks—This Month And Every Month

The Point: 

President Biden and the new Democrat-controlled Congress must provide real relief by sending every person in America a monthly $2,000 survival check until the pandemic ends. 

One more check is not enough: 

• Instead of debating whether Americans were promised $1,400 or $2,000, Democrats should be focusing on getting recurring survival checks into the hands of every person in America as soon as possible.
• Across the country, families are hurting. The unemployment rate increased from 3.8 percent in February 2020 to 6.7 percent in December 2020. People are worried that they will be evicted from their homes. They don’t know if they’ll have the money for food to last the rest of the month, let alone medicine. These problems aren’t going away anytime soon. 
• We’ve been here before. Leading economists agree that in 2008, a Democrat-controlled U.S. government failed to provide adequate relief to everyday people during the largest financial collapse since the Great Depression. Biden and the Democrats cannot make the same mistake now. 

Biden has a mandate to deliver relief at the scale of the crisis: 

• The fight for a $2,000 survival check helped Democrats secure victory in the Georgia Senate run-offs, mobilizing and inspiring people to vote for a vision of a government that meets the basic needs of its people. 
• Last week, in a full-page ad of The Washington Post, 34 mayors representing cities that are home to more than 16 million Americans called on President Biden to deliver recurring checks throughout the duration of the crisis.
• 60% of U.S. voters support monthly cash payments. And even among Republican voters, more people support recurring $2,000 checks until the pandemic is over than oppose them.

Dive Deeper:

• U.S. Voters Overwhelmingly Support $2,000 Direct Payments, New Polling Shows. Voters across party lines overwhelmingly support direct payments of $2,000. While over 80% of voters—including 74% of Republicans—support a one-time payment in that amount, strong majorities—60% and 62%, respectively—also support making them recurring and retroactive for the duration of the pandemic.
• Democrats’ Win in Georgia Shows What Voters Really Want from Government. It’s time for political leaders, no matter their party, to listen to voters—and provide financial relief from the pandemic.
• Joe Manchin’s voters aren’t letting him stop $2,000 checks. The intense backlash to his recent comments criticizing $2,000 stimulus checks signal the growing momentum for guaranteed income programs—and the emerging power of voters who care more about substantive results than partisan skirmishes.