here was a point in my life where I thought politics were reserved for old, sophisticated white people who hosted dinner parties, drank Bordeaux by the case, and laughed at plebeians. 

Politics never truly made sense to me.  At home, my family never talked about it, and growing up in a city as overwhelmingly liberal as New York it seemed like I rarely needed to dig beneath the surface. The country and the lens I watched it through (a pair of extremely liberal, quirky specs bought off the sidewalk vendor on St Marks Place marred with pizza grease) condensed the world of politics into two things: Democrat – good. Republican – bad.

As COVID wrapped its wiry fingers around the world, the blue and red lenses that used to make sense, no longer did. There was simply too much nuance to subjugate an entire group of people as “racists” or “snowflakes”, and doing so felt as hypocritical as calling all people of one group, “terrorists”, “drug dealers” or “lazy”. 

Understanding and being involved in politics has now become as essential to me as the air we breathe, because what the government does and how the media portrays has a DIRECT effect onmy life.

Not to say that it hasn’t in the past, but the repercussions of a stimulus package or lack thereof mean that there are now more FOR RENT signs on Bleeker Street, that my Linkedin feed is filled with posts like, “I’ve been unemployed for six months. I have a newborn. I’ll take any media, ad sales, writing job. Please share if you have leads”, and worse, hundreds of thousands of people’s lives have been lost.

Avoiding politics used to be a luxury that I could afford. But now, it’s so tied to everyone’s lives that it should be everyone’s duty to understand, REALLY understand what the fuck is going on. Not just skim the title of some random article you saw on a Facebook feed, or rehash the argument from The Daily Show or that podcast – but to actually dive in and question all of your sources. 

The media, ourselves included, will always be biased (though we try our best NOT to) we encourage you to do your own research, form your own opinions, and then, figure a way to take action to help spur the change that you want to see in the world. No matter how small. 

Now onto the details:

STIMULUS TALKS – Nancy Pelosi Gives the Senate a 48 Hour Deadline to Make a Decision on the Stimulus Package (EOD Tuesday, Oct 20, 2020)

Sometimes it feels like the Senate and the House are like Rachel and Ross in Friends the way they arguedt back and forth over the “We were on a BREAK!” debacle. It’s been dragged on for way. Too. Long.

In order to fully understand what is going on right now with Pelosi’s deadline, we’ll need to rewind a bit to see exactly WHY the second Stimulus Package still hasn’t passed yet, six months later. There are three important characters here:

• Nancy Pelosi / The Democrats (House)
• Mitch McConnell / The Republicans (Senate) 
• Donald Trump / White House (Twitter) 

Negotiations for the passage of the second Stimulus Package have ongoingsince April, after the first $1200 Stimulus checks were sent out as part of the $2 Trillion dollar CARES Act (largest in US history). Nearly 6 months later, there still has been no agreement – despite many contentious conversations behind closed doors between House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Leader Mitch McConnell. 

A Second Stimulus Package (and a general rundown of what’s been going on all Summer) 

The Democrats proposed the HEROES Act, a $3 Trillion bill that included the FPUC $600 extended to January 2021 was denied by Senate Republicans, who instead opted for a dramatically smaller $1.1 Trillion HEALS Act. 

The decision is so hard to agree upon because of the fundamental differences in ideologies between the Democrats and the Republicans. While Republicans advocate for fiscal conservatism (reduced government spending and national debt), the Democrats favor more government regulations to support community and social responsibility. This site breaks it down very easily. 

In its simplest terms – Republicans think the Government should be more hands off in terms of offering a relief package, allowing for individual capitalism to fix itself. Democrats think the government needs to pay up, and be more involved. 

Hence,  conversations have been happening throughout the summer, extending into the  month long Senate recess in August (which was postponed) but a decision was never made. Check out our last article HERE to get the full scoop on the differences. 

Fast forward to October, as the election looms closer and closer, President Trump turned to Twitter to tell his team to hold off ALL talks of the Stimulus Package until AFTER he wins the election in November. The focus switched from Stimulus Package to the appointment of Amy Coney Barret as Supreme Court Justice. Consider it a power play to get more supporters on his side as his approval rating has dropped.

The stock market dropped over 400 points immediately after this tweet. 

Side note: WHY are our government decisions that affect millions and millions of lives being told via Twitter again!

With global backlash, his approval rating shrinking, a brief stint of COVID and cases on the rise, Trump reversed his decision and decided to offer up a larger stimulus package, his OWN $1.8 trillion package which would offer up $400 in unemployment benefits per person. To make things more confusing, Senate leader Mitch McConnell and Republicans disagreed with THIS package as well because…well, like we said…they don’t want to be further invested into more national debt. 

In turn, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi rejected this offer and gave the Senate 48 hours to make a decision on a stimulus package worth between $1.8 trillion and $2.2 trillion. She said Trump’s package was lacking and asked for the Senate to agree by EOD, Tuesday, Oct 20th to pass a deal in order to make it before the Election. It’s estimated that they will instead be pushing forward again the same HEALS Act that was rejected by the Democrats last month. 

As negotiations continue, states across the country are you guessed it…running out of money. In New York, October 20th (UPDATE: AS OF OCTOBER 20TH – THIS HAS BEEN EXTENDED TO JAN 1, 2021) marks the deadline of the Eviction Moratorium on commercial businesses. Unemployment is on the rise and over 1.5 million New Yorkers are unable to afford food according to the New York Times. As of now, who’s to say what will happen next but we’ll hope for some clarity in the upcoming presidential election this coming Thursday at 9pm EST between President Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden. Make sure to vote! 

For the first time since March, NYC had its first day with 0 deaths from the Coronavirus. As the city bounces back, food pantries like La Jornada have stepped up to keep New Yorkers fed. This is part of a 3 part series on New Yorkers who have taken the initiative to feed New York City on their own.

It’s 8 AM and Pedro Rodriguez is setting up at the La Jornada Food Pantry in Flushing, Queens.

I can tell by the text that he sent me at 5 AM that he’s already been up for hours. Such would be the case when you’re in charge of feeding over 4,000+ New Yorkers. Every. Single. Day. 

Over the phone, he sounds like the type of grandpa who slips you a twenty every time you visit. His voice is a warm hug permeated with a deep, hoarse chuckle, and by the end of our 45-minute conversation, I feel like I’ve known him for years.

Around Queens, he is revered for not only feeding the food insecure, elderly and disabled, but also building out English classes for immigrants and handing out backpacks for kids. According to the La Jornada Facebook page, he’s become somewhat of a local celebrity.

Throughout our call, he is interrupted twice by neighbors greeting him excitedly, as if he is the Latino “Don” of the James A Bland Housing Projects (where they post up every week to hand out packages filled with 3 days worth of rice, beans, milk, eggs for the neighborhood). 

“Our goal is that the next generation will not need a food pantry. How do we take them from HERE to THERE?”

For 12 years, Rodriguez and his team of volunteers have been on a mission to help Queens’ most impoverished. “One Saturday morning,” Rodriguez tells me, “I was walking in Bayside, on my way to church and I saw all these day laborers waiting on the corner for work. Something that day changed my life…I said to myself, why are we not helping them?“ He started handing out sandwiches, food, and coffee to them, and soon, became a resource.

Real quick recap on the Day Laborers here. There are between 8-10,000 day laborers in New York City. You’ve likely seen groups of mostly men waiting for work on street corners, parking lots, or home improvement shops in the morning. They’re waiting to be selected for work. Mostly for landscapers, moving companies, construction sites, and more where they can be paid under the table. Many are undocumented, and they are the most susceptible to being taken advantage of. Several reports cite workers being underpaid (or not at all), being in hazardous work conditions, without union rights and health benefits.

For months, Pedro and his family would speak to the laborers. That Thanksgiving, he invited them to dinner at the church. 

“We invited them over for Thanksgiving. That day, women showed up with children, and we realized it was the day laborers’ families. We had to help them too.”

The next day, Rodriguez and his family headed to Jetro, a restaurant supply food store and started buying bulk food to repack and give to the families. For over 5 years, the pantry fed 50 – 200 families before moving to Flushing where they took over a closed community center that was closed for 10 years.

“Imagine. A community center closed for 10 years. What does that mean for the people here? What have they missed out on?”

Besides providing day laborers and their families with food, the pantry has since expanded to include weekly runs delivering food to seniors and the handicapped with food trucks. Six days a week, they are serving food out of the community center.

Since the Pandemic, however, the phones have been ringing off the hook. Queens has been one of the hardest hit. Within the first few weeks of the outbreak, there were over 7,000 cases within a seven-square-mile radius, and Elmhurst Hospital (only a 10 minute drive away) was considered the “epicenter of the epicenter”. 

Queens, considered to be the most diverse city in the world, is one of the most densely populated ethnic enclaves, with several multi-generation families living within the same household. 

Pantry donations used to be done through appointments following a strict schedule. Now, they’ve grown from feeding 1000 people a week to over 4000 -5000 families per week.

Some days over 500 people are turned away. 

“Hunger is not a problem. Poverty is a problem. Hunger is a symptom of poverty. And in the next few months, they’re only going to get worse“

The line for food, Pedro fears, is only going to get longer as the aftereffects of the virus continue.  Since April 2020, the unemployment rate jumped from 4.1% to 14.5% with over 1.8 million jobs lost.  (Editor’s Note: As of publishing today, the number has dropped to 13% though experts believe it will still take long to recover from).

The bulk of the recipients of this food pantry are undocumented, day laborers, or gig workers from the food industry who lost their jobs in the pandemic. Disproportionately black and brown.

Within the next few months, as more jobs begin to shut down, the faces of hunger will be your neighborhood bartender who can’t pay rent, the freelance DJ with 20k followers, or the journalist who got let go from Buzzfeed. 

For several of these New Yorkers, they are unable to apply for benefits, and community pantries like La Jornada will be the main source of food for these families. According to the FoodBank of NYC, more than 1.2 million New York City residents or 14.4 percent of all New Yorkers are food insecure. 

Last year, the city’s entire budget was $60 million. Earlier this year, in response to the Coronavirus, Mayor De Blasio pushed it up to $180 million dollars. “We are going to have millions of people waiting online for food”. Pedro stated. “I really believe that we will be needing to feed over 1 million families, it’s $180 a family”.

“How long can you feed a family on $180? 3 weeks, a month?”  

For the first time since March, NYC had its first day with less than 0 deaths from the Coronavirus. At its peak, NYC was seeing over 11,000 deaths a day, and where the city was dying before, we are now in the early stages of a hunger pang that could slowly decimate hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers. 

As New York City seems to be starving, one integral question. How long can volunteers like Pedro feed these communities? The government is simply not doing enough. 

I ask Pedro what is something he would want people to take away from the article besides donating. His voice cracks as he tells me. “Just let them know that the volunteers are doing hard work here. They are all young people coming every single day to help. People say the young are no good, but they’re here with me. Every. Single. Day.”

To Help:

Donate via GoFundMe (This was created earlier this year to help pay their rent but the funds will go towards food distribution) Or via Paypal

You can connect Pedro or us with any larger food distributors or suppliers who are willing to donate food en masse – pedrolajornada@gmail.com or call 917-880-5693.

You can volunteer your time as well by visiting La Jornada on Facebook and the site.

You can share our story across social and the NBC news report HERE.