Trump bill to cause most harm to America’s poorest

With their eagerness to cut the social safety net, Republicans seem to be treating millions of Americans who earn less than $50,000 as undeserving takers. "People earning under $50,000 are major targets of the Republican agenda. Their health coverage is targeted. Their food security is targeted," said Marr. "They are left out of key provisions expanding tax cuts, like the child tax credit. They are most at risk from the Republican tariffs. They'll be hurt across the board." 

Marr said the budget bill treats "these people very harshly". 

 "It's the harshest bill we've ever seen since budget deficits became an issue 40 years ago," he said. "This is the first bill that simultaneously targets programs for poor people and working-class people to pay for it, and then takes that money to pay for tax cuts for very wealthy people. It makes poor and working-class people worse off. That's not been done before."…

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jul/03/trump-budget-bill

 

Senate overhauls Trump’s tax bill, setting up brawl with the House - The Washington Post

The chamber suggests cuts to the child tax credit and SALT and is more heavy-handed on cuts to Medicaid than the legislation the House passed in May...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2025/06/16/trump-tax-bill-senate-republicans-child-tax-credit/

 

GOP senator Josh Hawley pushes huge increase to child tax credit

Such a plan could cost $2 trillion to $3 trillion over 10 years. That complicates the math for incoming Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) and House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), who have thin margins to extend President-elect Trump's signature tax …

https://www.axios.com/2024/12/17/josh-hawley-child-tax-credit-trump

Kamala Harris unveils 2024 policy agenda, including $6,000 child tax credit - The Washington Post

The most striking proposals were for the elimination of medical debt for millions of Americans; the "first-ever" ban on price gouging for groceries and food; a cap on prescription drug costs; a $25,000 subsidy for first-time home buyers; and a child tax credit that would provide $6,000 per child to families for the first year of a baby's life...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2024/08/16/kamala-harris-2024-policy-child-tax-credit/

Fact check: Vance falsely claims Harris is ‘calling to end the child tax credit,’ which she is actually calling to increase | CNN Politics

Vance's claim that Harris is calling to end the child tax credit is false. In fact, it is the opposite of reality: Harris has called for years to increase the child tax credit. As vice president, she has advocated for the permanent adoption of the enhanced child tax credit that was temporarily in effect in 2021 under a pandemic relief law – a law that was signed by President Joe Biden after it was passed by Congress with only Democratic support...

https://www.cnn.com/2024/07/29/politics/fact-check-vance-false-harris-child-tax-credit/index.html

Crowd ERUPTS As Biden Drops MASSIVE Announcement On Stage #TDR

"President Biden promised on Tuesday to continue pushing to expand child care subsidies, early education and paid medical leave, agenda items left unfulfilled during his three and a half years in the White House. 

The promises, made in a speech to a crowd of enthusiastic caregivers at Union Station in Washington, were meant to reassure Democratic voters that he would use a second term to fight against Republicans who blocked his ambitious measures. 

He called for 12 weeks of paid family or medical leave, large investments in preschool for 4-year-olds, the extension of a child tax credit to help working families, and investments to give families access to high-quality child care for $10 per day."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gA0N1p4FYnk

More Money for Parents? Both Parties Just Might Make It Happen. - The New York Times

If an expansion of the child tax credit passed, here's what would change and who would benefit...

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/30/upshot/child-tax-credit-poverty.html

What’s in the bill to expand the child tax credit and how it can help struggling families | PBS NewsHour

If the proposal becomes law, it would gradually increase the credit from $1,600 to $2,000 per child in 2025 and allow lower-income families to receive a refundable tax credit for each child. Right now, many only earn one tax credit for all of their children combined. It would also adjust the credits for inflation and increase what's available to those who pay little to no income tax…

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/whats-in-the-bill-to-expand-the-child-tax-credit-and-how-it-can-help-struggling-families

‘Have their cake and eat it too’: inside US big business’s tax cut campaign

"Wealthy corporations and Republican lawmakers in Congress are holding the poorest children in this country hostage in exchange for billions in tax handouts," Elizabeth Warren, the Democratic senator from Massachusetts, told the Guardian in a statement...

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/jan/12/corporation-tax-break-lobby

Opinion | America’s Increasing Child Poverty Is a Policy Choice - The New York Times

The government has a choice here. It can deliver cash transfers, enact public goods and establish a floor of livelihood where nobody suffers from poverty or want — or it can allow children and families to go hungry, unhoused, indebted and abandoned on the altar of the market. It is time to once again use our immense power and resources to reduce suffering and save lives...

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/25/opinion/us-child-poverty.html

Weekly Roundup: How 9/11 Accelerated Christian Nationalism (Bradley Onishi and Daniel Miller; Straight White American Jesus podcast)

Brad begins by tracing the extreme Christian nationalism of the 2020s to the years following 9/11. The thesis: the ways that Republican politicians and conservative pastors responded to 9/11 led to a new chapter of American Christian nationalism.

Dan then picks up the thread to discuss how Black churches and other groups are teaching Black history in Florida given the fact that it is being left out of school curricula in the state.

The episode finishes with an extended discussion of the lapsed child tax credit – and what it says about our country’s morals and priorities.
Interview: 

https://www.straightwhiteamericanjesus.com/episodes/weekly-roundup-how-9-11-accelerated-christian-nationalism/

Sen. Booker blasts GOP: ‘Morally obscenity’ of child poverty is a ‘policy choice'

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AK7qfKuM9Bw

Opinion | The best vehicle for addressing child poverty is right before our eyes - The Washington Post

President Biden and congressional leaders should not give up on a policy for which there is so much evidence that it works. Federal budget negotiations are underway. Bringing back at least some of the expanded child tax credit for the poorest families is a small cost for a substantial benefit to millions of American children...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/09/12/best-vehicle-addressing-child-poverty-is-right-before-our-eyes/

Sen. Whitehouse Defends the Child Tax Credit in a Finance Committee Hearing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5VtaBPSoClA

Opinion | The stunning drop in poverty is a huge story. We should build on it. - The Washington Post

Making the choice to alleviate poverty early in people's lives, many economists agree, puts children on a path to becoming healthier, happier, more fulfilled, more productive adults. We have perpetually failed to make that choice, but this time, we did make it, and it worked...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/13/poverty-decline-pandemic-relief/

Turns out an awful lot of US politicians see no problem with kids going hungry

…Republicans – the party that loves loudly proclaiming how "pro-life" they are and how much they care about family values – are largely to blame for the CTC expiring. Every single Republican in congress opposed extending the CTC. Joe Manchin, a supposed Democrat, also helped kill the program; he reportedly told colleagues that he worried that parents would waste the money they were being given on drugs. Did he have any evidence for this? No, of course not. In fact, studies show that 91% of households making less than $35,000 a year used the money to pay for food, shelter, clothing and other necessities…

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/apr/16/child-poverty-politicians-week-in-patriarchy

The sunsetting of the child tax credit expansion could leave many families without enough food on the table

…Nearly 60 million families with children received the first payment, which was sent out in July 2021. The payments were widely credited with bringing about huge declines in poverty and malnutrition. Our study found that the introduction of these advance payments was associated with a 26% drop in the share of American households with children without enough food...

https://theconversation.com/the-sunsetting-of-the-child-tax-credit-expansion-could-leave-many-families-without-enough-food-on-the-table-174947

Third Way examines how Build Back Better affects families across the country : NPR

Third Way's report found that changes to the child tax credit, child care cost caps, expansions to the Affordable Care Act and closing the Medicaid coverage gap could save families thousands each year...

https://www.npr.org/2021/12/01/1059861219/center-left-group-claims-democrats-spending-package-would-save-families-thousand

Parents use child tax credit on necessities such as food and bills, survey finds - The Washington Post

…Bureau officials also found, through data gleaned via its Household Pulse Survey, that fewer households with children experienced food insufficiency after the payments...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2021/11/18/child-tax-credit-spent-on-bills/

Child Tax Credit: What The New Monthly Checks Mean For Your Family : NPR

… eligible families qualify for up to $300 per month for each child younger than 6 and up to $250 for each child aged 6 to 17. So a family with three children ages 5, 7 and 16 could see an extra $800 per month in their bank account through the latter half of the year. The credit goes away once a child reaches 18...

https://www.npr.org/2021/05/17/997698543/new-monthly-child-tax-checks-will-hit-bank-accounts-july-15-what-you-need-to-kno