Romney proposes monthly payments for families with children

Sen. Mitt Romney on Thursday proposed providing monthly payments to families with children to help them weather the COVID-19 pandemic.

"This proposal offers a path toward greater security for America’s families by consolidating the many complicated programs to create a monthly cash benefit for them, without adding to the deficit,” Romney said in a press release.

The Utah Republican said the proposal would streamline existing family policies to create one universal child benefit, titled the Family Security Act.

Under the proposal, the existing child tax credit would be replaced with monthly payments of $350 for children ages 5 and under and $250 for children ages 6 to 17. Families would be capped at monthly payments of $1,250.

Romney says his proposal, if passing and signed into law, would "ensure that expecting parents receive the help they need to face expenses associated with preparing for a child, and low-income families would no longer have to choose between a bigger paycheck or maintaining eligibility for support."

Parents would be eligible to receive the cash benefit four months prior to their child’s due date, and it would continue to be administered on a monthly basis. The plan would immediately lift nearly 3 million children out of poverty, while providing a bridge to the middle class – without adding a dime to the federal deficit," the statement said.

      

The Romney proposal promises to:

• Cut child poverty by up to one-third in America;
• Support families from pregnancy through childhood;
• Promote marriage;
• Provide equal treatment for both working and stay-at-home parents; and
• Reform and consolidate outmoded federal programs to fully pay for the new proposal.\

It's not the first time the idea of monthly payments has come up. 

While a senator, Vice President Kamala Harris introduced legislation in May 20202 – along with Sens. Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont, and Ed Markey, D-Mass. – that would send $2,000 cash payments to every American who earns less than $120,000 until three months after the Health and Human Services Department has declared the public health emergency over.