You turn to us for voices you won't hear anywhere else.

Sign up for Democracy Now!'s Daily Digest to get our latest headlines and stories delivered to your inbox every day.

Trump Admin Wants to Restrict Access to Food Stamps for 3 Million People

HeadlineJul 23, 2019

The Trump administration is seeking to tighten restrictions on food stamps, in a move that could cut over 3 million people from the program. The Department of Agriculture wants to require some recipients of food stamps to pass a review of their income and assets to determine their eligibility. Currently, families who already receive federal assistance through the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program automatically qualify for food support. Food stamps benefit some 40 million Americans, or about 12% of the total population. Experts say the new rule would overwhelmingly affect working families, older Americans and people with disabilities. Democratic Senator Debbie Stabenow, the ranking member of the Agriculture Committee, said, “This proposal is yet another attempt by this Administration to circumvent Congress. [It] would take food away from families, prevent children from getting school meals, and make it harder for states to administer food assistance.”

The original content of this program is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. Please attribute legal copies of this work to democracynow.org. Some of the work(s) that this program incorporates, however, may be separately licensed. For further information or additional permissions, contact us.

Non-commercial news needs your support

We rely on contributions from our viewers and listeners to do our work.
Please do your part today.
Make a donation
Top