Democrats and Republicans have failed to reach an agreement to extend desperately needed relief and benefits for millions of Americans. For twenty weeks in a row, more than a million additional people have newly filed for unemployment benefits. Extra benefits from the federal government have kept the country from sliding into an all-out second Great Depression. But now they’ve lapsed, and election-year posturing has trumped effective negotiations.

Democrats and Republicans had months to negotiate a new stimulus package. Instead, after House Democrats passed a $3 trillion “Heroes” relief package in May, Senate Republicans refused to discuss it, Donald Trump weighed in that he was in “no rush” to sign another stimulus bill, and the Democratic leadership responded with no fight at all.

Unemployment benefits and eviction moratoriums lapsed last Friday and millions are being pushed off a financial cliff. People like Kelyn Yanez who used to clean homes and wait tables, lost both jobs in March and is now facing, along with her three children, eviction. “Right now, I have nothing,” she said. Or those like Daniel Vought, whose unemployment benefits, mired in a bureaucratic black hole for months, never arrived to begin with. He found himself with $10 in his pocket and no place to go. There are countless more untold stories as millions of people await the results of congressional theatrics and dysfunction. “Not knowing when and if they will extend our benefits,” wrote one person on reddit, “is cruel and inhumane and like some of you have said, I’m beginning to think that neither party cares but time will tell.”