(Radio Iowa) – Congresswoman-elect Ashley Hinson of Marion says she would favor more targeted federal assistance rather than stimulus checks to most Americans in the next round of pandemic relief. “I definitely support the direct payments to people who need them,” Hinson says. “I think the real issue here is the fact that it took months and months to even start negotiating this relief package and they pushed it clearly to the last minute, which is very frustrating.”

Hinson, a Republican, will be sworn in as a member of the U.S. House on Sunday, to represent Iowa’s first congressional district. She calls the 600-dollar payments that HAVE begun arriving in the bank accounts of some Americans a start. “For some families that’s not enough right now,” Hinson says. “I know there are families who need it, but I also had someone message me they wanted to send theirs back, so I think that there’s a way that maybe we could better target some of that and narrowly focus relief going forward.”

President Trump has called on congress to pay most Americans two-thousand dollars. That proposal passed the Democratically-led House on Monday. Hinson says she hasn’t read the proposal, which has stalled in the Republican-led U.S. Senate. “As you know, things change very quickly, but I said the $600 payment is a good start and we can go from there,” Hinson says.

President-elect Joe Biden has called the current round of stimulus checks a down payment on a larger relief bill he plans to introduce once he takes office. “For me, the priority in the first quarter is going to be looking at all of that, figuring out how those payments, you know, if they were effective, if they were enough,” Hinson says. “And then we do need to be responsive and we do need to take a next step, if that’s needed.” Hinson says when she becomes a voting member of the House next week, she’d like to see a package that not only provides direct federal payments to financially-stressed individuals, but to industries that have taken a hit during the pandemic.