'They only care about votes. They don't care about voters': Americans in need of 2nd stimulus are fed up with government leaders

Shannon O’Brien’s daughter turns 15 years old on Wednesday, but O’Brien doesn’t know if he’ll be able to get her a birthday present this year because he receives so little from unemployment and he’s drowning in unpaid household bills. O’Brien, like millions of Americans across the country, is now dependent on the government to help make ends meet with a second stimulus bill. As more time passes, Americans don’t care how it gets done; they just want something done.

Video transcript

SHANNON O'BRIEN: When they say save money for a rainy day or only spend money-- this is the rainy day. You need to help the American people. You've always been bailing out each other, lining each other's pockets, bailing out the banks, bailing out government. Now, suddenly when it comes to us, you want to pinch pennies? Oh, no, no.

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My name is Shannon O'Brien, and I'm from upstate New York near Albany, the capital. My profession in New York has been destroyed. I'm a bartender, and New York was very hard hit. And as a bartender, a lot of your income comes from tips, which don't necessarily figure into the calculation of your unemployment.

So I'm making about 15% to 20% of what I did when I was employed through my unemployment. Obviously, when you've gone through life, you accumulate bills that are more in keeping with your actual income, not with this reduced 15% to 20%. So I'm very far behind in bills. I've had to sell family heirlooms. I've had to bum money from friends just to get by, and it's humiliating.

KIM LEMA: My name is Kim Lema, and I'm from Rhode Island. Everybody's scared. I know how it feels, because I lost a lot of friends to the coronavirus, and we're suffering. People on disability, SSI, SSDI, early retirement, they only get one check a month. The little bit of extra money they get, they're spending it all on hand sanitizer, Lysol, wipes.

There's no money. Food is anonymous right now. We go buy a dozen eggs out here, they want $5. They're giving people raises on the EBT $4. What is $4 going to do for the American people? The rich get richer, and the poor are suffering. They need to help us, and they need to help us all now. We are the American people.

SHANNON O'BRIEN: I have a daughter. My daughter's birthday's next week. I don't have any money really to buy her a gift, or to give her money, or take her out anywhere because now after the expiration of the LWA benefits that Trump signed into executive order, I'm back down to $106 a week, which is gone way before it even gets here.

In fact, the next four weeks of it are already gone, if not further down the road. It's really pennies, and you know, it's difficult. And I've been looking for work. But at the same time, I have to be mindful, because I am caretaker of my 78-year-old mother who has health problems. So me being exposed to the virus, if I bring it home to my mother, it could be all over.

KIM LEMA: I'm disabled. I have leukemia. I have emphysema, COPD. I have to be very careful of who I'm around. I have to keep it to a minimum. I canceled holidays. There's not going to be Thanksgiving at my house. I'm scared.

But we need the money, because the cost of living is anonymous right now, and we can't do it by ourselves with one income. You need more than one income. You need several. In the lower income and people that live in subsidized housing and are on one just SSI, one check a month, everybody's struggling right now. We're hurting. We need the government, the federal government to help us.

SHANNON O'BRIEN: My vote for Congress will be 100% dependent on whether or not a stimulus deal is at least achieved, if not signed, by the day of the election. I live in a swing district. I've met my congressman before. He's a nice guy.

I like him. He's a Democrat in a district that went for Trump by 7 points. And he won two years ago by a decent margin for this type of district. And he's a good guy. But I can't reward Nancy Pelosi if she won't bring this across the finish line.

KIM LEMA: Figure it's both sides, but more of the Republicans because there's that little line in there helping the big companies, giving them tax breaks and giving them money. I don't think the millionaires deserve any money right now. This should be for the people that need it.

We need it. They don't need it. I mean, come on. Trump paid $750 in taxes? Come on. It's out of control. They need to put-- the Republicans and Democrats right now need to put all their politics aside and sign the stimulus package for the American people.

SHANNON O'BRIEN: Reason why I told you that my vote for Congress is dependent on the stimulus is because that's all these people understand. They only care about votes. They don't care about voters. And once the election's gone, we've got two years before they actually pay attention to us again.

So our leverage, as voters, is now. They talk about their leverage over Republicans or Republicans have leverage over Democrats, our leverage is now. And blind partisan loyalty, ideological loyalty isn't going to cut it for the American people. They need to be worried about their jobs.

I didn't just quit my job because I'm lazy. My industry just didn't evaporate because, you know, it's-- it's archaic or it's going out of style. It's the virus. Society was shut down. It destroyed our economy, put millions of millions of people out of work who don't want to be out of work.

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