Food stamp programs are being slashed in 32 states. These cuts will affect 30 million people who rely on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), each losing about $92 per month. The states that will be most affected are California and Texas, which have 5.1 and 3.6 million people on SNAP. Some 18 states such as Georgia have already cut people off early for political reasons — Republicans opposed even the modest amounts of assistance provided. This crisis is coming up right now due to the end of pandemic-assistance funding, even though Covid hasn’t gone away.
In a typical instance, a Baltimore resident went from receiving a monthly disbursement of $281 to $23. And they were never warned beforehand about these cuts. They did receive a letter in the mail six days after they lost benefits! This is outrageous.
There are more than 40 million people in the U.S. who rely on food stamps. Over this past year, our cost of living has skyrocketed. Groceries are up 11% more than last year. And this May millions of Americans, generally the very same people, will be dropped from Medicaid, losing life-saving medical coverage.
We live in a society where rich people can get bailed out when a bank collapses, to the tune of many billions of dollars. But they tell us we don’t have the resources to feed and provide health care to those who need that kind of help. This is also outrageous! We need to fight back against these attacks on our very lives.
