On Tuesday, over 150 of the nation’s top economists penned an open letter calling for “immediate, bold action” to prevent the country’s coronavirus-induced recession from getting worse. 

The letter, published by the Economic Security Project and the Justice Collaborative, urged members of Congress, who will be back in session on July 20, to craft a generous and multifaceted COVID-response package that includes extended and enhanced unemployment benefits, and significant aid to state and local governments. 

Above all, the letter urges Congress to pass recurring direct cash payments to individuals and families that would be triggered by weak economic data, like high unemployment rates, and last until the economy recovers. Essentially, the proposal would issue government checks to Americans on autopilot, so that the amount of dispersed aid increases or decreases without further action by Congress.

“Even after businesses start to re-open and jobs begin to come back, there will be significant economic fallout, and demand will continue to lag if people don’t have money to spend,” the letter says. “Regular direct stimulus payments tied to economic indicators will help families stay afloat and drive economic activity.”

Economists refer to the policy as an “automatic stabilizer,” and they consider it an important recession-fighting tool because once written into law,  it’s designed to kick in without further iterations of federal legislation. Automatic stabilizers inject money into the economy when it’s weak and withdraw stimulus when it’s strong, skipping the guessing game between federal politicians and analysts of trying to adequately scale individual relief bills.

During past recessions, economists, policy analysts, and Congress have engaged in a cumbersome dance of predicting the length and breadth of economic downturns to draft and implement fiscal policies. Following the Great Recession, for instance, Congress passed a $840 billion relief bill that included virtually zero support for states and municipalities, a misfire that contributed to a sluggish, decades-long recovery. 

To avoid these often delayed and incorrectly targeted fiscal responses produced through the conventional political process, the cohort of economists are pushing for policies — like recurring direct cash payments and continued expanded unemployment insurance — that pin amounts received and periods of eligibility to the jobless rate rather than arbitrary deadlines agreed to by politicians. 

Professor Dietrich Vollrath, chair of the University of Houston’s economics department and a signatory of the open letter, said that using automatic stabilizers keeps Congress, an institution that generally lacks the foresight to accurately and efficiently forecast the length and severity of recessions, from estimating the appropriate magnitude of fiscal aid. 

“When we passed the CARES Act in March, and offered an additional $600 in unemployment insurance per week, the end of July seemed like a long time away,” Vollrath said. “It seems that under competent leadership, a pandemic would have been handled by then — obviously it hasn’t.” 

Though automatic stabilizers are gaining steam among center and left-of-center academics, as well as policy wonks on Twitter, they face opposition on Capitol Hill. 

During Congress’ first round of negotiations for coronavirus relief, the House passed a $3 trillion package that omitted automatic stabilizers after several Democrats who introduced legislation that included the policy feature compromised to advance other fiscal priorities. Moreover, this was the first bill the Democratic-controlled House sent over to the Senate, so even if it had included automatic stabilizers, it would’ve likely have been negotiated out of the final version. 

Most recently, in response to many Democrats signalling their support for tying automatic stabilizers to an extension of the $600-per-week unemployment insurance bonus, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, citing the Republican argument of creating a disincentive to work, said it would be “a mistake.” 

Another conservative argument against automatic stabilizers is its price tag: a Congressional Budget Office score of an automatic stabilizer policy–which could last for several years as unemployment is projected to remain high for at least the remainder of 2020–would be larger than that of a fiscal package that expires, say, after a few months. 

But proponents of automatic stabilizers assert that this is a false comparison, and a more astute one must account for the cost of potentially not doing enough. 

“To me, the cost of doing too little is enormous,” said Claudia Sahm, a signee of the letter and director of macroeconomic policy at the Washington Center for Equitable growth. “I am very honest and transparent about how these proposals are big dollars and would add to the deficit. In a recession, I believe it’s totally worth it.” 

Even so, as states and cities roll back their reopenings and reinstitute stay-at-home orders, economists who are in favor of extending enhanced unemployment insurance argue that there isn’t much empirical data to support the disincentive argument. 

Rather, they claim that given the US economy’s current lag in demand, and because most people can’t safely return back to work, an effective fiscal response is one that puts money into the hands of Americans without expecting or forcing them to leave their homes. 

“The whole point of [unemployment insurance] and direct payments is for us to pay people’s rent and fixed expenses so that, for the love of God, they stay put and don’t get sick,” Vollrath said. “Don’t go anywhere.” 

Of course, the reality is that the US is five months away from a presidential election. 

And with an incumbent who has turned mask-wearing into a political litmus test, and with little appetite for bipartisanship in Washington, it’s unclear  what Congress will come up with. 

“Nobody knows right now what [Congress] is actually going to pass,” said Sahm. “They’re going to pull a rabbit out of a hat, but we have no idea if it’s going to be a tiny little runt of a rabbit or if it’s gonna be the big one.” 

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“We don’t have time in the middle of a pandemic for publicity stunts,” said McEnany.

McEnany said that Nita Lowey, chairwoman of the House Appropriations Committee chairwoman, was “unable” to provide a purpose for the hearing or its subject matter. McEnany cited this lack of purpose as justification for barring the hearing.

But earlier this week, President Trump said that he was barring Dr Fauci’s testimony before House committees because the House is comprised “Trump-haters” wanting to damage him politically. 

Instead of testifying before the Democrat-led House, McEnany said that Dr. Fauci would instead testify before “the Republican-controlled Senate”. McEnany said that the notion that Dr. Fauci was being blocked from testifying was “farcical”, and that Democrats in the Senate would be able to question Fauci here.

House and Senate hearings serve as a valuable form of oversight as part of the government’s separation of powers. As Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Dr. Fauci is an important member of the government’s coronavirus task force.

On Tuesday, Trump said that this task force would be dissolved by the end of May. Today, President Trump withdrew this decision. McEnany refused to ask questions on the matter.

McEnany also said that not everyone needs to be tested for the coronavirus. Instead, testing should be strategically focused on vulnerable populations such as nursing homes, as well as meat processing facilities.

“The notion that everyone needs to be tested is simply nonsensical,” said McEnany.

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The largest economic stimulus package in modern U.S. history includes direct payments of $1,200 to many individual Americans, including those who earn up to $75,000, and an additional $500 per child.

“I just signed the CARES Act, the single biggest economic relief package in American History – twice as large as any relief bill ever enacted,” said Trump this afternoon on Twitter. “At $2.2 trillion dollars, this bill will deliver urgently-needed relief for our nation’s families, workers, and businesses.”

The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act secures $100 billion for healthcare workers on the front lines of the crisis and provides $150 billion for state and local governments. The package also allocates $58 billion to aid airlines, which have been hit hard by travel bans and general fears of flying.

The bipartisan legislation includes $377 billion in loans for small businesses and $250 billion towards unemployment insurance, with $600 checks per week for four months for unemployed workers. Self-employed workers will be newly eligible for unemployment benefits. 

The act establishes a $500 billion government lending program to businesses hit hard by the outbreak. The law prohibits taxpayer-backed loans from going to businesses owned by President Donald Trump, members of his administration or members of Congress. 

The package allocates $25 billion for food assistance, including $16 billion for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), and secured $24 billion for the U.S. Department of Agriculture to stabilize the farm economy. 

 The U.S. reported 85,356 cases of Covid-19, the disease caused by the novel virus, with 1,246 deaths, as of Friday afternoon, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The U.S. has reported more cases of the coronavirus than any other country, surpassing China and Italy.

The House of Representatives earlier today passed the bill by voice vote, after Republican Representative Thomas Massie tried to block the legislation by forcing a recorded vote, which would have required legislators to log their position individually. 

“They (Democratic senators) transformed a Republican corporate-focused bill into a Democratic workers-first focus,” said House Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi this afternoon on the House floor. “We are able to dramatically expand unemployment insurance and defeated attempts on the Senate’s side to claw back the $600 per week added benefit that would provide essential relief.”

The Senate unanimously approved the legislation late Wednesday night after tense days of negotiations between Democrats, Republicans and White House aises. The Senate has struck down two previous stimulus bills, as Democrats pushed to make several changes to the legislation. 

Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin said on Wednesday during a White House press briefing that the stimulus package could keep the U.S. economy afloat for three months and mentioned the government expects to issue direct payments to citizens within three weeks of the bill being signed into law.

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Tuesday’s midterm elections were not the stinging rebuke of the Trump Administration that Democrats had been hoping for. The party has retaken the House of Representatives, gaining at least 27 seats. Despite this success, Democrats lost ground in the Senate, and the House results were not as clear-cut a victory as rosier projections had expected. These mixed results make the election difficult to categorize overall. More than anything, the election shows a country that is drifting ever further apart politically.

In the House, the results largely conformed to pre-election polling. According to FiveThirtyEight, Democrats won the majority of seats that leaned toward their party, Republicans won most GOP-leaning districts, and Democrats clinched a slight majority of the races pegged as tossups.

At the state level, Democrats saw gains in several key states. Pennsylvania stands out in particular, with Democrats gaining four seats in the wake of a court-ordered redistricting that made the state more competitive. In New Jersey and Virginia, Democrats built on existing advantages, winning three seats in each. Meanwhile, Democrats won two seats apiece in Florida, Iowa, Michigan, and Texas.

Overall, the House races accentuate the existing trend of urban-rural polarization. The three most surprising Democratic victories, NY-11, SC-1, and OK-5, all came from urban communities. The same applies to Georgia’s 6th District, which Republican Karen Handel narrowly won in last year’s special election. On Tuesday, the district voted in Democrat Lucy McBath after a hard-fought contest. Also, the two House seats Democrats won in Florida were centered on Miami-Dade County. These results suggest that the divide between urban and rural voters are only intensifying under the Trump Administration.

One other noteworthy trend in last night’s House races is the success for minorities in key races. The 116th Congress will see Native American and Muslim women to join its ranks for the first time. Native American candidates Sharice Davids of Kansas and Debra Halland of New Mexico won their races Tuesday. Two Muslim candidates also won, with Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar scoring victories in Michigan and Minnesota. Democratic socialist Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez also made history – at 29, she is the youngest woman ever be elected to Congress.

In the Senate, the Democrats faced an uphill battle to retake the chamber this year, with 26 seats up for reelection to only nine for the Republicans. With so many incumbents facing challenges, many of them in heavily conservative states, Democrats were unable to avoid significant losses. Joe Donnelly of Indiana fell behind early in the night and never recovered, while North Dakota’s Heidi Heitkamp and Missouri’s Claire McCaskill also lost decisively. Bill Nelson in Florida held on more stubbornly, and is currently seeking a recount.

Meanwhile, the Democrats saw little success from their limited opportunities to flip Republican seats. Beto O’Rourke suffered a narrow defeat in his challenge to Ted Cruz in Texas. Tennessee’s election was more clear-cut, with Marsha Blackburn besting Democrat Phil Bredesen. The race to replace Jeff Flake in Arizona has not been called, but Kyrsten Sinema trails Martha McSally. The sole Democratic Senate victory came from Nevada, where Dean Heller was ousted by Jacky Rosen.

Despite the mixed victory for Congress, last night’s most promising gains for Democrats came at the state level. Democrats won seven Governor’s races, as well as winning legislative chambers in at least six states. The gubernatorial victories ranged from bluer states like Illinois and Maine, to swing states like Wisconsin and Nevada, to a surprise victory in highly conservative Kansas.

The common thread across many of the gubernatorial races was dissatisfaction with unpopular incumbents. Illinois and Kansas voters blamed incumbents Bruce Rauner and Sam Brownback for catastrophically damaging the two states’ finances. Wisconsin’s Scott Walker and Maine’s Paul LePage alienated voters with their abrasive approaches to governing. And in Michigan, Governor Rick Snyder has suffered for his mishandling of the water contamination in Flint.

Democrats also enjoyed two historic successes in last night’s Governor’s races. In Colorado, Jared Polis became the first openly gay man to be elected to a Governor’s mansion. And in New Mexico, Michelle Lujan Grisham became the first Latina woman to get elected Governor as a Democrat.

Not every Governor’s race went well for the Democrats, however. Andrew Gillum narrowly lost his race in Florida, and Richard Cordray was bested in Ohio. Stacey Abrams hasn’t conceded defeat in Georgia, but she trails Georgia Attorney General Brian Kemp by 1.6 points. The loss in Florida is especially critical – Republican success increases the danger of favorable redistricting after the 2020 census, putting Congressional victories in the state even further out of reach for Democrats. This is less of a concern for Ohio, where voters approved rules for a bipartisan redistricting process earlier this year.

All in all, Tuesday’s results should still be considered a success for Democrats, albeit a qualified one. Republican control of the Senate will only exacerbate conservative influence in the judiciary branch, possibly for years to come. However, seizing the House of Representatives will let Democrats conduct investigations into Trump Administration misconduct, which may cripple the White House. Also, the House is responsible for the first drafts of all spending bills, giving the Democrats considerable sway over the federal budget.

Moreover, the Democratic success at the state level will improve their national prospects in future elections – many Congressmen begin their careers in state legislatures. The Trump Administration no longer has free rein to push its agenda, but that may prove the least of their worries.

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By Zehra Rehman

“I’m tired,” Elaine Kateb heard over the intercom before it went silent. Kateb, 70, then went back down the apartment building’s stairs. She and many other volunteers had spent that rainy day ringing doorbells in their neighborhoods to persuade people to vote for Domenic Recchia.

The race for New York’s 11th Congressional District seat has been one of the most competitive in the current election cycle, although the latest poll by NY1/Capital New York/Siena College shows Republican Michael Grimm leading 53-34.

Grimm won his seat in 2010 by defeating a Democratic incumbent. Democrat Recchia is running against him to represent Staten Island and part of south Brooklyn. Grimm has the advantage of incumbency but has been indicted on 20 federal charges including tax evasion and fraud. Democrats have looked at this as an opportunity to win back the only Republican congressional seat in New York City.

The Recchia campaign is based in two offices in Staten Island and one in south Brooklyn. The Democratic Party has been strongly backing Recchia including providing resources such as campaign staff and political ads. The campaign is made up of a paid staff along with hundreds of volunteers. This includes a core group of regular volunteers who have been essential for the Recchia campaign. Ranging in age from 10 to 85 years old, they are motivated by a combination of idealism and a desire to see the incumbent defeated.

The Recchia campaign has divided its activities into three stages. The first phase, which ended on Oct. 10, was voter registration. The second stage is canvassing and persuading voters to choose Recchia. The last stage, from Nov. 1 to 4, is Get Out the Vote, during which the campaign will make about one-third of its total voter contact. The GOTV efforts will be launched from staging locations in Staten Island and Brooklyn. In these last four days, the campaign will receive volunteers from across the country including students, union members and congressional staffers. Until then, the campaign staff and their team of volunteers do all the work.

Daren Dowlat describes himself as “a volunteer who came in and never left.” He makes phone calls to get more volunteers, goes door to door to give voters information and carried out voter registration. Dowlat started volunteering while looking for a job in the information technology field. After working on the campaign, he is considering a change in career direction to “try to clean up politics.”

Because of a disability, 81-year-old Phyllis Masci is not able to go door to door. She comes to the campaign’s Brooklyn office three days a week to work the phone bank and recruit more volunteers. The rest of the week she makes phone calls from home. Her reasons for volunteering are a dislike of the incumbent and a belief that Recchia will be a good representative of her district in Washington.

“I know he will do a lot for the community. I know he will!” she emphasized.

Volunteer Pat Sanchez has been working on campaigns for decades, starting with fundraising for Bill Clinton’s presidential campaign. A staunch liberal from Bay Ridge, she wants “to get this neighborhood blue.” She was surprised that Grimm remained popular in Staten Island after a video surfaced of him threatening a reporter. A recent opinion poll also showed that 24 percent of Staten Island voters are less likely to vote for Recchia because he lives in Brooklyn. The majority of the voters in the district live in Staten Island, where Grimm lives.

With the race drawing increasing attention, volunteers are arriving from outside New York and even one from another continent. Quentin Lefevre came from Paris to volunteer for the Recchia campaign. “I love the things that he wanted to implement in New York,” he said of Recchia. Lefevre also hopes to learn from this campaign and apply the experience to French political campaigns.

With a contact rate of less than 10 percent, door-to-door canvassing is a tedious part of campaigning, and one where volunteers are most needed. “Canvassing is becoming more important. Usually it doesn’t change minds but it turns out votes,” said Steven Brams, professor of politics at New York University. As part of the canvassing, campaign staff and volunteers try to persuade potential voters to sign pledge cards, which increase voter turnout by 6 to 8 percent.

After weeks of making phone calls for the campaign, Kateb went door-to-door for the first time on Oct. 11. Even when she made contact with voters, many refused to talk. While joking about “being too old for this” and it being “as much fun as a root canal,” she rang doorbells across Bay Ridge. She volunteers for Recchia because she wants to “work with candidates in whom I believe” and because Grimm is facing criminal charges. Above all, she feels a civic duty to participate in the political process, pointing out that “people in other countries would die for the opportunity to vote.”

With days left until the Nov. 4 election, campaign staff and volunteers are putting all their energy into getting their candidate elected.

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Muhammad Tahir stood tall over the sea of umbrellas and patterned headscarves, his face solemn as he held a soggy sign high above the crowd.

Hundreds of others flashed similar posters, all with the same six words printed in bold, black and white letters: “Today, I am a Muslim Too.”

Nearly 1,000 protesters gathered yesterday in Times Square to rally against the upcoming congressional hearings on “radicalization” of Muslims in America. The hearings, proposed by Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.) last year, are slated to begin this Thursday.

Tahir, 35, of Queens, who has lived in New York for 16 years, said it was only recently that he told his son—who was born four days after Sept. 11, 2001— about the World Trade Center attacks.

Still, Tahir said it did not prevent his son from feeling their effects.

“There was graffiti on the subway that said, ‘kill all Muslims,’” he said. “I was walking with my son and he said, “Dad, but I’m an American Muslim. It’s almost impossible to explain something like that to a child.”

According to a February Public Religion Research Institute survey, 56 percent of Americans consider the hearings “a good idea.”

Yet Cyrus McGoldrick, civil rights manager at the Council on American-Islamic Relations in New York (CAIR), said the hearings have also prompted a backlash from Muslims and other religious groups calling for King to reconsider.

McGoldrick added that so far, the senator plans to proceed as scheduled.

“We don’t expect our pressure will change his mind,” he said. “What we’re most concerned about is how the rhetoric will spread and perpetuate hate on the ground. By offsetting that rhetoric with a display of positive energy, our voice will be heard more clearly no matter what Peter King does in congress.”

The senator did not respond to requests for comment.

Ciara Ulloa, 19, of Queens, said she has been “harassed on the streets” for adorning a hijab, the traditional head covering worn by Muslim women.

“People have actually cursed me out when I wear these clothes,” she said, pointing at the purple paisley scarf wrapped around her hair.

Ulloa said that many times, it is her peers who launch the verbal attacks.

“At a tutoring center two years ago a kid called me a terrorist,” she said. “He told me Arabs weren’t welcomed there, that I probably had bombs in my backpack. I was born and raised in this country as were my parents I shouldn’t be treated any differently than any other non-Muslim American.”

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