We came, we invoiced.
Delivering the people’s demands for monthly stimulus checks.
By Stacey Rutland
We all know part of adulting is paying the bills. And when you don’t, the consequences include losing the service you were charged for.
This is the simple idea behind the Make It Monthly campaign we launched at Income Movement: to push our elected leaders to pay monthly stimulus checks to the people during this health and financial crisis. Congress has failed to provide the millions of Americans struggling under the crushing financial weight of the pandemic with adequate relief. $1,800 over nearly a year barely covers a single month of rent in most of the country. We need meaningful relief now — which is why we call for $2,000 checks for the duration of the pandemic’s economic crisis, and why we sent a bill to lawmakers for the many months that this relief is past due.
On Feb 4th we kicked off this campaign with a Day of Action: organizers across the country delivered $2,000 “past due” invoices to members of Congress for the direct, monthly stimulus support that that has been needed since the pandemic began. As part of the effort, led by Income Movement and the People’s Bailout coalition, these invoices had the names of more than two million people who signed a Change.org petition asking Congress to include $2000 monthly stimulus checks to the people during COVID. Invoices were delivered to 17 members of Congress, including key Senate leadership. Thousands more participated in our #MakeItMonthly Twitter storm that day as well.
Our Make It Monthly Campaign is about keeping the pressure up during this critical moment. We must sign petitions, write letters to Congress, call our Senators and even write letters to the editors of our local papers to demand, implore, and persuade our elected leaders to include monthly stimulus checks in the next legislation. We have created the tools so people can quickly and easily take these actions. Check them out at www.bailoutthepeople.com. These congressional actions are sponsored and supported by a broad coalition of organizations fighting for a basic, guaranteed income.
Our hope with the Make It Monthly campaign is to provide ways in which we can all get our voices heard by those whose job it is to ensure the people come out of this crisis both physically and financially healthy. It has been a hard year, but we’ve never had a better chance to finally achieve ongoing cash payments that will build gender and racial equity, help people keep their homes and feed their families, and begin the difficult task of creating a system that recognizes everyone’s inherent value.
Join us in this moment. Join us in this fight.
Stacey Rutland is founder of Income Movement.
