WASHINGTON — U.S. Rep. Cori Bush introduced a bill Tuesday to halt evictions for the duration of the COVID-19 pandemic, in her latest push for resumption of a national eviction moratorium.
In August, the St. Louis Democrat protested the expiration of a national moratorium by sleeping on the steps of the U.S. Capitol. Her protest sparked a new moratorium from the Biden administration, but one that applied only to places experiencing a surge of COVID-19 cases.
The new prohibition was quickly struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court. The conservative majority ruled that an eviction moratorium had to be imposed by Congress, not the Centers for Disease Control.
“The moratorium extension we helped secure saved lives for three weeks before it was shamefully struck down — shamefully struck down — by a partisan Supreme Court,” Bush said Tuesday in front of the Capitol. “Today we return to the Capitol with renewed courage and determination to introduce lifesaving legislation.”
Instead of a congressional decree banning evictions, the bill authorizes the Department for Health and Human Services to implement a residential moratorium during a public health crisis. It would remain in effect for 60 days after the end of the emergency.
There have been more than 33,200 eviction filings in Missouri since the beginning of the pandemic, according to the Eviction Lab at Princeton University. Evictions fell during the pandemic, as local and federal eviction moratoriums took effect. But last week, after expiration of a local ban against landlords initiating eviction based on non-payment of rent, there were 187 filings, the highest since before the pandemic.
While evictions were down in Missouri over the course of the pandemic because of local and federal protections, many facing financial insecurity felt a greater strain. The expiration of the federal eviction moratorium allowed for the enforcement of more than 1,000 eviction judgments in Kansas City, according to Kansas City Mayor Quentin Lucas.
Congress has already allocated more than $45 million in renters assistance in an effort to keep people in their homes as the virus has swept across the country. But a majority of the money has not been spent due to a lack of awareness of the program and bureaucratic hurdles to getting renters and landlords the assistance they need.
Stacey Johnson-Crosby, the president of the KC Regional Housing Alliance, said Congress should be focused on helping people access the money that has already been set aside for renters instead of blocking landlords from evicting tenants.
She said her husband recently tried to help a tenant get rental assistance, only to be stymied by the process.
“There is so much federal assistance available,” Johnson-Crosby said. “The way we prevent against evictions and protect against evictions is for the rent to get paid.”
U.S. Rep. Ayanna Pressley, a Democrat from Massachusetts, said the Department of Treasury needs to streamline the process and make it less difficult for renters to be able to access assistance.
“We need time,” Pressley said. “We have appropriated the funds, we need to get the funds out. Some states, there was suppression in every way. Some states had to have the infrastructure built. Honestly, we’ve been re-calibrating in real time.”
It is unclear whether the bill has enough support to make it through both chambers of Congress, where Democrats hold a narrow majority. Lawmakers face deadlines to fund the government amid intra-party grappling over a sweeping bill to accomplish some of the Biden administration’s top legislative priorities like expanding access to healthcare and combating climate change.
U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, a Democrat from Massachusetts, is sponsoring the Senate version of the bill. She said landlords should not have to bear the burden of missed rent payments, but that an eviction moratorium is necessary until the rental assistance funds can be distributed.
“The money is going out too slowly,” Warren said. “There are still billions of dollars to distribute and millions of families who need that help to avoid losing their homes.”
Bush said she hoped the bill would be able to pass because it was giving power to the Department of Health and Human Services instead of having Congress extend the moratorium on its own.
“Because we’re saying ‘you are the authority, so we’re making sure you have the authority,’ I think that makes the difference,” Bush said. “This is something that has to happen. We won’t stop until it happens.”
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