In June 2024, Google’s list of popular searches showed the search word “irs $8700 stimulus check irs gov.” The most-searched term showed that the IRS gave out $8,700 stimulus checks to qualified Americans through IRS.gov.
Along with the search about stimulus checks, the list showed other popular searches, such as North Korea sending balloons with manure and trash into South Korea and a woman being partly swallowed by quicksand on a Maine beach.
Some people in the U.S. may remember the COVID-19 economic effect payments and child tax credit payments that will be made in 2020 and 2021 when stimulus checks are brought up. Those real payments came straight from the IRS.
To be clear, this report that the IRS will be sending out $8,700 stimulus checks in 2024 is not true. If the offer of a stimulus check were real, major news websites would have a lot to say about it. We couldn’t find any reliable news about any new stimulus checks coming out in June 2024.
Snopes sent an email to the IRS to ask about the false story. Robert Marvin, a public relations expert for the IRS, told us about a news release from July 2023 that warned of text message and email scams using the real economic impact payments from 2020 and 2021 as an excuse. In part, that news release said, “But while the stimulus payments ended long ago, the related scheme has evolved and changed as scam artists look for new ways to adjust their message to trick people.”
Some scams promise stimulus checks, subsidies, incentives, and other benefits.
At the moment, it’s not exactly clear why the search for “8.700 stimulus checks from the IRS” broke out in the first place. Before, similar false claims that Americans could get free money came from scammy-paid ads that were shown to people on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, or another website or social media platform. People who saw those paid ads said that the current U.S. president, Congress, the IRS, or some other government-affiliated person or body had approved or would be giving out money or checks as a stimulus, subsidy, reward, or benefit.
People who clicked on those old paid ads were taken to websites that were not connected to the government. People who used those websites were asked to fill out surveys. The purpose of the surveys was apparently to connect people with companies that could help them get services for homes, seniors, or other groups of customers. Depending on the ad, the people in charge of the fake ads may have been after a commission fee, maybe for sending people to the ads and collecting data about them.
Source: Snopes
