Biden plans a 3rd wave of executive actions for Friday, including increased food stamps and pushing the Treasury to hand out stimulus checks faster
- President Biden is planning a series of moves to increase payments to combat hunger and poverty.
- An official says they include larger food-stamp payments and pressure to issue more relief checks.
- Biden has proposed a $1.9 trillion relief package to Congress that includes far bolder moves.
President Joe Biden is planning a new wave of executive actions Friday to bolster food aid to people struggling with hunger during the coronavirus pandemic, and to push for more comprehensive delivery of stimulus checks.
The actions are far narrower in scope than the $1.9 trillion relief package Biden has proposed. But the actions, including some executive orders, can be taken immediately.
A new relief package requires votes in Congress that could take several weeks and will most likely face Republican opposition.
"The American people can't afford to wait, and so many are hanging by a thread. They need help," Brian Deese, Biden's economic advisor, told multiple news outlets in a briefing Thursday.
Here are some of the measures Biden is planning, per reports out Friday morning in The Washington Post, NPR, and CNBC:
- To tell the Agriculture Department, which administers the food-stamps program, to increase benefits available to families who are normally reliant on school meals by 15%.
- To expand access to the enhanced Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, lifting the food stamps of some of the poorest by about 15% a month.
- To tell the Treasury to speed up the delivery of direct relief payments to those who are eligible but have not yet received them. (Biden also wants a new round of checks, but needs Congress to approve them.)
- To shield workers from losing their federal benefits if they turn down a job because it would substantially increase their risk of getting COVID-19.
Since Biden took office Wednesday he has issued a series of executive orders and other actions designed to undo Trump administration policies, and to address the coronavirus crisis and the frail state of the US economy.