The President’s FY 19 budget is the latest illustration of the Trump administration’s indefensible approach of favoring wealthy Americans and large corporations while cutting vital support that helps low-income Americans meet their most basic needs like food, housing, and health care. The budget proposes extremely harsh cuts to nearly every program that helps reduce poverty and support ordinary working Americans — all on the heels of enacting massive, fiscally irresponsible tax cuts that will benefit the most well-off and balloon the national deficit.
In addition to slashing Medicaid, housing assistance and benefits for people with disabilities, the budget would radically restructure SNAP (CalFresh in California) and cut nutrition assistance by $213 billion over ten years – eliminating nearly 30 percent of total program funding. Ignoring over 40 years of SNAP’s success at reducing hunger, lifting struggling Americans out of poverty, and providing long-term health benefits to children, the budget proposes to take the country backward and increase hunger and hardship. The President’s proposals this year remain as ill-advised and harmful as they were last year.
Upending SNAP’s successful partnership between government and food retailers
The budget proposes fundamentally restructuring how SNAP benefits are provided, upending SNAP’s successful and efficient public-private partnership with retail stores in favor a new government-driven approach. Under the proposal, USDA would hold back 40 percent of monthly food assistance from an estimated 37 million people. The government would use about half of these funds to give the households a box of non-perishable foods while “saving” the other half — $130 billion, or about 20 percent of all SNAP benefits. This haphazard approach would put food assistance at risk for 1 in 9 Americans, and take revenue from 260,00 retailers (over 25,000 in CA) – grocery stores, mom and pop corner stores, and farmers’ markets. The assumption that government can buy and provide food more efficiently than millions of American households is faulty and unrealistic, and ignores the reality that participants empowered to buy their own food is the best solution.
Ending important state options that help Californians access CalFresh
The budget proposes an additional $85 million in cuts to SNAP, which will eliminate or reduce food assistance for millions of participants by:
- Subjecting certain older adults, up to age 62, to SNAP’s harsh three-month time limit if they can’t meet strict work requirements every month;
- Forcing states to apply the three month time limit even in areas of high unemployment with few available jobs;
- Eliminating the state option CA and many other states use to support working families struggling to make ends meet in areas with high housing and child care costs;
- Repealing the state option in CA that allows CalFresh participants to own a reliable car to get to work and accrue modest savings until they get back on their feet;
- Eliminating the minimum benefit of $15 per month, which would cut benefits to 2 million individuals nationwide – many low-income seniors and people with disabilities;
- Penalizing larger families by capping SNAP/CalFresh benefits at the level for a household of six, effectively eliminating food assistance to the additional household members; and,
- Ending the SNAP/CalFresh nutrition education program.
Read more from the the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities about the stark vision for America the President’s Budget’s stark vision for America.
Learn more about the specific proposals to cut and restructure SNAP/CalFresh.
What’s next in the budget process?
While the President’s budget will not move forward in Congress as written, specific proposals will likely find their way into proposed legislation this year, including the Farm Bill, scheduled to be reauthorized this year. You can stay up to date on the Farm Bill and other federal nutrition policy by signing up for CFPA’s Nutrition Action Alerts.
CalFresh helps alleviate hunger and poverty in every California congressional district. Learn
more about the importance of protecting and strengthening CalFresh in the Farm Bill by viewing and sharing CFPA’s Farm Bill and CalFresh Congressional District Fact Sheets.
Questions? Contact: Jared Call at 213.482.8200 ext 201
