Of the $5.2 trillion that the U.S. government has committed to the response to the pandemic since early 2020, about one-sixth went to state governments for the public health emergency and to boost their economic recovery. Across the six pieces of COVID-19 legislation passed so far, the federal government has allotted more than $800 billion in grants to states.

Two of the funding vehicles—the Coronavirus Relief Fund (CRF) and the State and Local Fiscal Recovery Fund (SLFRF)—together make up almost 40% of this funding, with separate but significant investments in programs for K-12 education, rental assistance, and public health.

Legislation in response to the pandemic spanned administrations and provided aid to states in numerous ways, including funding for new programs and for existing ones that, like Medicaid, often get a boost during economic downturns. Although dollars went to support programs in each major area of budgeting, flexible pots of money in the Coronavirus Relief Fund and the State and Local Fiscal Recovery Fund—which together totaled $307 billion for states—were the largest category of funding going to states.

The CRF and the SLFRF differed from other types of federal pandemic spending in part because of the flexibility they allowed for state decision-making. The CRF supported immediate relief and other costs due to the public health emergency between March 1, 2020, and Dec. 31, 2021. The SLFRF provided additional funding for economic recovery, with both a longer timeline for use and greater flexibility for states in how they could spend the money.

Though smaller in size and generally less flexible in nature, other programs that have received funding through pandemic legislation—such as those targeting education and health care—have also been important funding streams for states. For example:

• Education. The Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund sent states more than $184 billion across three rounds of funding that was largely passed on to local school districts to address pandemic-related challenges to K-12 education. Other education funding included the Governor’s Emergency Education Relief Fund and education programs for individuals with disabilities.
• Health. During the pandemic, an enhanced Medicaid matching rate has provided budget relief for stressed states. Other health programs receiving support have included COVID-19 testing, vaccine preparedness, substance use and prevention, and funding for the public health workforce.
• Income security. Significant pandemic funding to support income security went to programs to help child care providers cope with pandemic-related costs and gaps in service, through the Child Care and Development Fund and Child Care Stabilization Grants. Other dollars went to school meals, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, and the Low-Income Housing Home Energy Assistance Program.
• General government. Emergency Rental Assistance sent $31 billion to states to support households in retaining housing along with capital projects and other funding for infrastructure and broadband development.
• Community and regional development. Nearly all of this spending was sent through the Public Assistance Program, FEMA’s largest grant for disaster relief and recovery, at $37 billion. Additional funding includes Community Development Block Grant and Emergency Management Performance Grants.

Many of these dollars were distributed to states through existing channels, such as unemployment insurance and Medicaid, but federal legislation also provided funding though new programs, such as Emergency Rental Assistance.

Aid to states span bills and years

The roughly $800 billion in pandemic aid to states came from multiple federal sources. Toward the beginning of the pandemic, then-President Donald Trump declared a national emergency, approving major disaster declarations for all 50 states, five territories, and 32 Tribes, and unlocking public assistance and other federal emergency funding. Congress then passed a series of bills, outlined below in chronological order:

• The Coronavirus Preparedness and Response Supplemental Appropriations Act, enacted before the national emergency declaration, provided $878 million to states for crisis response support and epidemiology and laboratory capacity.
• The Families First Coronavirus Response Act sent a total of $60 billion over fiscal years 2020 and 2021 for supplemental Medicaid funding, as well as $2 billion for unemployment insurance and food assistance.
• The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act provided $151 billion across approximately 45 programs, with $112 billion for states in the Coronavirus Relief Fund.
• The Paycheck Protection Program and Health Care Enhancement Act offered almost $9 billion to states for COVID-19 testing.
• The Consolidated Appropriations Act of December 2020 included $120 billion for states, with much of the aid going to the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund, Emergency Relief Assistance, and CDC testing funds.
• The American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA), passed in March 2021, provided the largest investment to states for pandemic response thus far at $433 billion, with funding for programs supporting education, child care, public health, and more.

These significant investments on the part of the federal government have meant that grants to states were significantly higher than they have been over the past 15 years. (See Figure 2.) Pandemic aid is in addition to the grants that states regularly receive from the federal government: States get roughly one-third of their revenue from the federal government, which helps to pay for health care, schools, roads, public safety, and other services. In a typical year, Medicaid dollars make up about two-thirds of all grants to states; previous Pew analyses have found that Medicaid and other health funding has driven a slow but steady increase in grants to states.

Grants to states also spiked with the federal response to the Great Recession, which started in December 2007. In February 2009, Congress passed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, with the largest direct support for states coming from increasing the share of the Medicaid matching rate and the creation of a state fiscal stabilization fund. Additional funding went toward education, transportation, and nutrition assistance, among other purposes.

Increased federal aid to states during a time of crisis is common, but the response to COVID-19 has seen an infusion of dollars that will have reverberating effects for years to come—especially as states invest additional federal dollars from the recently passed Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. The long-term impact of this funding is unknown, but states have opportunities to approach this unprecedented time with tools for sound fiscal planning as they navigate decision-making around these new federal funding streams.

Methodological notes

All of the listed totals for bills are Pew calculations. For programs that sent more than $1 billion to states, researchers filtered funding to include only dollars to states, but a small amount of funding to localities is still included in the analysis. Territories are not included in state totals; the District of Columbia is included in state totals. Lost wages assistance was also filtered out of the analysis. The primary data source for this analysis is the federal funds information (FFIS) database. Additional data sources include FEMA’s Public Assistance Program; the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s data sets on state, tribal, local, and territorial COVID-19 funding; the Bureau of Economic Analysis’ GDP figures; and Medicaid Financial Management Reports for fiscal years 2020 and 2021. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services provided the fiscal year 2021 data over email on May 4, 2022.

Rebecca Thiess is a manager and Madalyn Bryant is a former senior associate with The Pew Charitable Trusts’ fiscal federalism initiative.