Update (8:30 a.m., Dec. 30): As President Donald Trump’s push for $2,000 checks has stalled in the Senate, some of the $600 payments have already hit Americans’ bank accounts.
Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said $600 payments were expected to be deposited as early as Tuesday night. Paper checks will begin to go out Wednesday, he Tweeted.
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.@USTreasury has delivered a payment file to the @FederalReserve for Americans’ Economic Impact Payments. These payments may begin to arrive in some accounts by direct deposit as early as tonight and will continue into next week (1/2)
— Steven Mnuchin (@stevenmnuchin1) December 29, 2020
Trump wants the Republican-led Senate to follow the House and increase the checks from $600 to $2,000 as the nation continues to reel from the pandemic.
Senators will be back at it Wednesday as Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is devising a way out of the political bind, but the outcome is highly uncertain.
Update (Noon, Dec. 28): President Donald Trump reluctantly signed the COVID-19 and annual federal spending package after previously voicing his objections.
The president continues to demand larger direct stimulus checks of $2,000, but without congressional approval on that, Americans will still see $600 checks.
On Monday, the Democratic-led House is set to vote to boost the $600 payments to $2,000, sending a new bill to the Senate. There, Republicans have the majority but reject more spending and are likely to defeat the effort.
For now, the administration can only begin work sending out the $600 payments.
Update (9:30 a.m., Dec 23): President Donald Trump on Tuesday suggested that he may not sign Congress’ massive COVID-19 relief, which would send most Americans $600.
The president threatened to torpedo the $900 billion package in a video he tweeted out, calling on lawmakers to increase the direct payments to $2,000 for individuals and $4,000 for couples.
He told lawmakers to “get rid of the wasteful and unnecessary items from this legislation and to send me a suitable bill.”
He did not specifically say he would veto the bill.
Read more: Trump threatens to torpedo COVID relief with new demands
Original (Dec. 21): It’s official. On Sunday, Congress has sealed a deal on a new COVID-19 economic relief package to the tune of nearly $1 trillion.
The agreement includes a second round of stimulus payments and will provide financial assistance to those that are unemployed and businesses, schools, and more that are affected by the coronavirus pandemic.
More specifically, the relief package will grant stimulus checks of up to $600 per person, which could be reduced based on a person’s income.
According to CNBC, the new relief package could mean a family of four would receive up to $2,400.
Exact income criteria and timing for the second stimulus package, as well as other details of the plan, have yet to be released as of noon on Dec. 21. (This article will be updated when the text becomes available.)
Just an update: Still no text for the Covid/funding package.
— Jake Sherman (@JakeSherman) December 21, 2020
The expected per-person amount is half of the $1,200 many Americans received during the first round of stimulus checks in March.
The IRS sent $1,200 checks to millions of Americans as part of a stimulus relief package to help people impacted by the coronavirus pandemic. Stimulus checks were sent to people based on federal tax returns from 2018 or 2019.
Multiple reports indicate that the people who will receive the first direct payments for the second stimulus package are individuals whose direct payment information is already on file with the IRS. The first round of checks that were sent out in March were deposited directly into taxpayers’ bank accounts.
According to CNN, experts are expecting checks to take at least two weeks before the Treasury can deposit cash directly into individuals’ bank accounts.
“The timing could be more challenging this time, but the IRS could likely begin to get the money out in January,” Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center spokesperson Howard Gleckman said.
If you received the first stimulus check, that does not mean you automatically qualify for the second. If you made more money in 2020 than in previous years, your adjusted gross income could push you out of the income limits, which again, have not yet been made public.
Similar to the first round of stimulus checks, payments are expected to start phasing out for individuals who earn more than $75,000 annually.
CNET made a chart that shows how much money you could potentially receive based on the $600 stimulus check proposal:
Supplemental jobless benefits in the amount of $300 per week are also expected for a term of up to 10 weeks - shorter than the 16 weeks in which jobless benefits were given to individuals to the tune of $600 per week under the CARES act earlier this year.