What You Need to Know about the Child Tax Credit

Dear Allies,

Starting tomorrow, July 15, eligible families can get advance payments of the Child Tax Credit (CTC), which is designed to help families offset the cost of raising children. The American Rescue Plan improved and expanded the CTC for tax year 2021, which means that more families are eligible for money to stay healthy! Families will get an even bigger CTC and can receive payments on a monthly basis, rather than having to wait until they file their 2021 tax returns in 2022. Families can receive the CTC if the children have social security numbers, even if their parents don’t.

This week, we want to share some great resources and tools that our partners and other leaders have developed to help explain what the Child Tax Credit (CTC) is and how immigrant families can access the money they are eligible for.

Many PIF partners have created and published resources and guides on how to access the Child Tax Credit (CTC). We’ve compiled this list of FAQs, fact sheets, and other resources to help you and the communities you serve understand what the CTC is and their eligibility is, and how families can access those payments. 

• CLASP fact sheet: Click here to read CLASP’s fact sheet that answers key questions about the CTC and immigrant families. (Spanish version)

• MomsRising FAQ: Click here for easy-to-understand answers to 24 common questions!

• GetCTC.org Site (Code for America): Click here for tools (including an FAQ) from GetCTC.org that helps families claim their credit. (Spanish version)

• Get It Back Campaign (CBPP) 2021 CTC Resources: The Get It Back Campaign compiled a menu of outreach tools and additional resources to help people access the funding they’re eligible for with the CTC. 

• IRS materials on the CTC: Click here for a range of flyers, posters, and guides, including many available in Spanish, Chinese (simplified and traditional), Korean, Haitian Creole, Russian, Vietnamese.

The 2021 Child Tax Credit (CTC) expansion provides a historic opportunity to reduce child poverty in the United States by more than 40 percent. Your efforts to help people get advance CTC payments are essential. Many people will need help to understand their eligibility and to use the IRS Non-filer portal. Navigators are trusted, community-based guides that help marginalized people get their payments. They can answer questions, help people fill out the non-filer form, provide space and technology, or help address other barriers.

This training TODAY, July 14 at 3pm ET, hosted by the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities and Code for America, will help you become a CTC navigator for your community. We will cover what resources are available, what support you can provide, and take you step by step through the Non-filer Portal and CTC UP Portal.

• KION-TV (Salinas, California) – Immigration attorney assures local families that the Child Tax Credit won’t affect immigration status.

• Univision 23 (Dallas-Fort Worth) – CLASP’s Wendy Cervantes explains that undocumented parents can claim the CTC for their children with SSNs.

• Boston Globe – On the persistent barriers facing eligible immigrant families’ access to the Child Tax Credit.

In Solidarity,

Eddie Carmona & Renato Rocha, on behalf of the PIF Team

Visit us at https://protectingimmigrantfamilies.org/