Checks from the U.S. Treasury, mailed with letters from President Donald Trump, are landing in Americans' mailboxes weeks before the midterms, but some of those receiving them aren't impressed.
Ellen Allen, who runs the nonprofit West Virginians for Affordable Health Care, got a $500 check at her home near Charleston on Monday, and she told NPR the money seemed to be a "political stunt."
"People aren't going to be fooled by this," Allen said. "People are hurting. People are feeling the cost of healthcare all year long."
The $500 checks went to people in the 30 states who use Healthcare.gov who earn too much to qualify for subsidies – the group hit hardest when the Republican-controlled Congress let Biden-era premium subsidies expire. Allen, who has a serious eye condition, drained her retirement savings to pay $1,967 a month for coverage until she turned 65 and qualified for Medicare.
Trump also announced $90 checks for about 20 million people enrolled in traditional Medicare.
"The $90 is — I mean, that's just nothing," Allen said. "If they wanted to do something meaningful, they would work on affordable healthcare instead of just sending out checks every now and then."
Ethics expert Kathleen Clark, a professor of legal and governmental ethics at Washington University Law School, said the letters accompanying the checks, which tout Trump's record and criticize the Biden administration, cross a legal line.
"This reads like electioneering," Clark said. "This reads as though it's intended to influence votes. That is prohibited by law."
She said the payments may violate the Hatch Act and could be an unauthorized use of funds. Neither pot of money, marketplace fees paid by insurers and a Medicare improvement fund, has ever been used for direct payments before.
"It looks like a pretty desperate effort to, in essence, bribe the recipients of this letter to vote in gratitude to Trump in the upcoming midterm elections," Clark said.
Even a conservative scholar was baffled. Joseph Antos of the American Enterprise Institute called the move "inexplicable" and mocked the size of the Medicare checks.
"You can go out to McDonald's and buy probably two hamburgers and a shake for $90 [and] maybe buy half a tank of gas," he said. "I don't get it, and I don't see any advantage to anybody, including Donald Trump."
A White House spokeswoman dismissed the criticism as "out-of-touch," saying Trump "returned their hard-earned money" after Americans were "overcharged" for running the Obamacare exchange.
The checks arrive as voters' trust in Republicans on health care is falling. A new KFF poll found 42 percent of voters trust Democrats to handle health costs, compared with 22 percent who trust Republicans, double the gap from April.