John Oliver rails against another 'COVID-related catastrophe,' the looming evictions crisis

John Oliver on the looming eviction crisis
(Image credit: Screenshot/YouTube/Last Week Tonight)

The coronavirus pandemic is bad enough on its own, but also "we have a huge COVID-related catastrophe that's actually just around the corner," John Oliver said on Sunday's Last Week Tonight. "As if things weren't bad enough, in the middle of a pandemic, we may be about to see evictions on the rise," a "shocking" but "completely foreseeable" crisis given the hit to jobs and incomes as work stopped. While state and federal economic measures and moratoriums "undoubtedly helped hold back the tide, those mechanisms are now starting to run out or expire, and if we do nothing, experts are predicting horrific outcomes," he said, "with millions of people left vulnerable" to homelessness.

Even during the moratoriums, landlords were filing papers to evict tenants at the first possible chance, and some courts have held hearings online — sometimes "throwing people out of their house via Zoom, a platform you're only using because it's not safe for people to leave their homes," Oliver said. "The fact is, we're about to go out of our way to throw people out of their homes at the worst possible time, and even in normal times evictions are incredibly damaging, with long-term effects."

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Peter Weber, The Week US

Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.