Fox News pundit says Americans who would benefit from Covid stimulus checks were ‘pretty much screwed anyway’

Talk radio host and self-proclaimed Christian finance guru Dave Ramsey went on Fox News to decry proposed coronavirus stimulus checks, claiming that people who significantly benefit from an extra $600 to $1,400 were "pretty much screwed already".

Mr Ramsey's statement was made during a Fox News' interview in which the hosts and Mr Ramsey were discussing the student debt crisis, which he said was a real problem, but then undermined by claiming efforts to help individuals with massive college loans was just a political ploy to "buy votes".

Later, Mr Ramsey was asked about the coronavirus stimulus checks, which he said he did not support.

"I don't believe in a stimulus check," Mr Ramsey told Fox News host Bill Hemmer. "Because if $600 or $1,400 changes your life, you were pretty much screwed already. You've got other issues going on. You have a career problem, you have a debt problem, you have a relationship problem, you have a mental health problem, something else is going on if $600 changes your life."

In 2019, there were 34 million Americans living under the poverty line. There are still 31 million Americans claiming some form of unemployment benefit, which was massively exacerbated last year due to the coronavirus.

Mr Ramsey went on to say he was not criticising people facing financial hardship and admitted that had previously filed for bankruptcy.

"And that's not talking down to folks," he said. "I've been bankrupt, I've been broke and I work with people every day who are hurting. I love people. I want people to be lifted up."

Mr Ramsey hosts a financial radio show and has sold numerous books offering financial advice from a "Christian" perspective. The radio host is worth nearly $500m.

Lisa Rowan, a consumer finance writer at Forbes Advisor, pointed out that numerous issues that do not include personal failures contribute to Americans' financial struggles.

"I think Dave Ramsey is forgetting some 'other issues' like income inequality, public health, and the burden put on women and caretakers during the pandemic," she wrote.

Wajahat Ali, a writer at The Daily Beast, pointed out that the dismissive attitude Mr Ramsey showed toward Americans facing financial hardship exemplified the hypocrisy of claims that conservatives care about the working class.

"Main Street. The Average Joe. The Common Man. The Heartland. The Rust Belt," he wrote. "Nope, Dave Ramsey and Fox News are totally not elitist and living in their own bubble and removed from the suffering of "ordinary Americans." Their finger is on the pulse!"

Mr Ramsey went bankrupt after changes to banking regulation went into effect in 1986. At the time, Mr Ramsey was working as a real estate agent and financed his purchases through bank loans.

After the change in regulations, Mr Ramsey was forced to pay back his loans, which left him bankrupt.

Susan Dury, who wrote about Mr Ramsey in 2007 for Nashville Scene, said Mr Ramsey was unable to sympathise with most people who went bankrupt because his personal financial tragedy was the result of bad deal making, and not instability, medical debt or job loss as is the case for many Americans.

“He didn’t lose his job, or have huge medical bills, or dig himself into credit card debt or gamble his money away. He was an over-leveraged dealmaker, a hotshot who stretched himself too far and who got caught in a change of federal banking regulations,” she wrote.