Tell the Senate: Expand the Child Tax Credit now and reject attacks on low-income families
Cynical Senators are playing politics with the Child Tax Credit―and with the lives of millions of families with young children.
Some members of the Senate are lining up to block a tax package that will benefit 16 million children in lower-income families via an expanded CTC, despite a broad bipartisan House vote. Why? For some, the answer is simple: pure politics.
Expanding the Child Tax Credit is popular and is proven to dramatically reduce child poverty levels. So why are some members of the Senate trying so hard to stop the Senate from moving forward on this bipartisan package, and kill the CTC with poison pill amendments? Maybe because they think they can get a bill with more corporate tax breaks and a weaker CTC in the next Congress. Or maybe they don’t want to hand President Biden a legislative victory on an issue he has consistently championed. Whatever the reason, they are denying low-income families with children a bigger refund check just as millions of families are filing their taxes. We need Congress to act by the end of April to make it easier for people to receive a higher CTC as soon as possible. That’s why we are holding Senators accountable to take up this bipartisan tax package now.
The expanded Child Tax Credit included in the Tax Relief for American Families and Workers Act would lift 400,000 children out of poverty in tax year 2023, rising to 500,000 above the poverty line in 2025. It would also add much needed income to about 16 millionchildren in families struggling to meet basic needs.
Click “START WRITING” to send a message to your Senators right now and urge them to reject the stalling tactics of politicians playing political games and pass the expanded Child Tax Credit for low-income families before the end of tax season. Children and families need help now!
☰
Take Action
Subscribe
Donate
Across the country, support is building for expanding the Child Tax Credit.
Across the country, support is building for Congress to once again expand the Child Tax Credit, with an increasing number of local media outlets taking note of the growing rise in hunger among families with children since the additional CTC payments were halted last December.
On Tuesday, in a story headlined “A push to revive Child Tax Credit for struggling NH families,” Public News Service (PNS) reported that the number of New Hampshire families with children who report they “sometimes or often” did not have enough to eat in the previous week has increased by 50 percent in the last year.
The story quotes Michael Reinke, Executive Director of the Nashua Soup Kitchen and Shelter, who said requests for family food boxes are up 25 percent from this time last year. His organization is urging lawmakers to make restoring the Child Tax Credit a top priority.
“Running out of the things that are more expensive — running out of meat, running out of milk, eggs — those are the highest demand right now,” Reinke observed.
Reinke added that the majority of people he meets at the soup kitchen are working, sometimes at more than one job. “You can be working full-time and still not be able to make all of your ends meet,” Reinke emphasized.
The story reports that in Utah, just a year after the monthly payments stopped, the number of families with children reporting food insecurity increased by 74 percent. Gina Cornia, Executive Director of Utahns Against Hunger, told PNS that lawmakers should reinstate the $300- to $360-per-child payments, especially with inflationnear double-digits.
“With the price of food, and with the price of gas and all of these other financial pressures these families are feeling, reinstating the monthly Child Tax Credit would really help ease those economic concerns for families,” Cornia contended.
Look for a number of other stories detailing how families need the expanded Child Tax Credit to pop up in the next week and a half or so. We’ll bring them to you when they do!
