In recent days, tenant activists have stormed courthouses in Kansas City and New Orleans. They’ve crowded, chanting, into real estate law firms in New York City. They’ve protested outside a mayor’s home in Los Angeles and marched with signs through another mayor’s neighborhood in Milwaukee. 

Their message to landlords and government leaders: Don’t allow evictions to occur during a global pandemic. Tenant activists are worried about the millions of unemployed Americans who now stand on the edge of an unprecedented housing crisis that could leave as many as 40 million people facing eviction by the end of the year.