Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin answers questions during a House Financial Services Committee hearing on “Oversight of the Treasury Department’s and Federal Reserve’s Pandemic Response” in the Rayburn House Office Building in Washington, December 2, 2020.
Greg Nash | Pool | Reuters
WASHINGTON — The Trump administration will begin sending stimulus payments to millions of Americans as early as Tuesday evening, the second such direct payment to Americans amid historic unemployment and ongoing business closures.
In a pair of tweets Tuesday evening, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin wrote that payments “may begin to arrive in some accounts by direct deposit as early as tonight.”
He also wrote that the government would begin the process of mailing out paper checks on Wednesday for individuals without government-registered bank accounts.
Last week, Mnuchin told CNBC that Americans who qualify for direct payments could see those funds hit their bank accounts in a matter of days.
“The good news is this is a very, very fast way of getting money into the economy. Let me emphasize: People are going to see this money at the beginning of next week,” Mnuchin told CNBC host Jim Cramer.
“So it’s very fast, it’s money that gets recirculated in the economy,” he added. “People go out and spend this money, and that helps small business and that helps getting more people back to work.”
At the time, the latest bill under consideration by lawmakers included provisions similar to those in the original CARES Act, the $2.2 trillion relief package approved in March.
Individuals would receive $600 in direct payments. The payments would decrease for people who earned more than $75,000 during 2019. And they would phase out completely for those who made more than $99,000 that year.
The $600 amount, half of the first stimulus payment in March, passed through Congress last week after months of negotiations between the White House and congressional Democrats.
The bill, signed by President Donald Trump late Sunday, also extended key unemployment benefits and allocated additional funding for small businesses. The last-minute rush to send stimulus checks reflects the gargantuan task facing the Trump administration in its final weeks.
The latest revelation comes as the Senate works to pass legislation that will increase direct payments in the year-end coronavirus relief package.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Tuesday blocked Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer‘s attempt to unanimously pass a bill that would bump up the direct payments to $2,000.
The Kentucky Republican later Tuesday introduced a bill that would boost the size of the checks to $2,000 from $600, repeal Section 230 legal liability protections for internet platforms and create a commission to study election issues. The bill would meet all of President Donald Trump‘s recent demands, which are unrelated, but would not get Democratic support and become law.
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