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Millions of US Families Could Soon Go Hungry Thanks to Trump-GOP Government Shutdown
"Trump and congressional Republicans have driven America headfirst into a government shutdown," said one campaigner. "It is poor women and children who will feel the impacts first and worst."
Oct 09, 2025
A federal food program serving vulnerable women and children could run out of money next week due to the Republican government shutdown, a prospect that on Thursday spurred calls for Congress to pass a bipartisan funding bill that protects nutritional assistance for needy Americans.
The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) provides free staples including fresh produce, milk, and formula vouchers for nearly 7 million pregnant and breastfeeding parents and children under the age of 5. The program currently benefits more than 1 in 4 young US children.
“We will have babies being born to low-income women who will not have any breastfeeding support, and they will have no way to get infant formula if they’re not breastfeeding,” Nicole Flateboe, executive director of Nutrition First, Washington state’s WIC association, recently told the Washington State Standard, calling the specter of defunding a "disaster."
The Trump shutdown is threatening to force kids to go hungry. We need, at the very least, a bipartisan spending bill that protects access to food and clean water.
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— Food & Water Watch (@foodandwater.bsky.social) October 9, 2025 at 7:58 AM
In Puerto Rico, 76% of children under age 5 rely upon WIC. In California, that figure is 38%, followed by 35% in New York and 34% in Delaware and North Carolina.
"WIC is a lifeline that helps new parents keep their babies fed. But thanks to Republicans' government shutdown, WIC funds could run out in a matter of weeks," Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) said Thursday on social media. "Republicans must reopen the government NOW and stop playing with people's lives."
Food & Water Watch warned Thursday that over 5 million US children stand to lose food assistance, with many likely to go hungry, if the government shutdown is not resolved.
“Trump and congressional Republicans have driven America headfirst into a government shutdown," Food & Water Watch managing director of policy and litigation Mitch Jones said in a statement Thursday. "It is poor women and children who will feel the impacts first and worst."
Democrats in Congress have introduced a short-term appropriations bill that would fully fund WIC, a proposal that stands in stark contrast with Republican legislation that would maintain current funding levels for the program. The GOP proposal is the equivalent of a $600 million cut, due to inflation and price pressures, according to Food & Water Watch.
Making matters worse, the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA) signed by President Donald Trump in July stripped Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits from more than 2 million people. The legislation contains the deepest cuts to Medicaid and SNAP in history while slashing billions from other essential social programs to fund massive tax breaks for billionaires and corporations.
The OBBBA ends health coverage and food assistance for millions of people at a time when more than 47 million Americans—including 1 in 5 US children—are living in food insecure households.
The Trump administration's staffing and funding cuts at the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), which administers SNAP, have also hamstrung the government's ability to provide assistance to those in need.
“It’s a big mess,” Flateboe said. “We don’t have a lot of trust that the USDA is going to handle this real seamlessly.”
While Trump said this week that he would use tariff revenues to temporarily fund WIC, it is unclear how he could do so absent an act of Congress.
"Congressional Republicans need to put food back on the table for struggling families by passing a bipartisan spending bill that protects food access," Jones said.
Congresswoman Nydia Velazquez (D-NY) said on social media: "Families shouldn’t pay the price for GOP dysfunction. We must protect WIC and the people who rely on it."
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Imagine If the Fight Was Over How to Improve and Expand Medicare and Social Security—Not Destroy Them
If we help families survive rocky times rather than fall deeper into poverty, all of us benefit as a society; if we don’t, then millions of stories like mine won’t be possible.
Jun 02, 2024
Life is unpredictable. And sometimes, no matter how hard you work, life throws curve balls that hit you in the gut.
That’s what our tax dollars are supposed to be for—a helping hand when we’re most in need. More than once in my life, the social safety net came through for my family. And thanks to that help, we’re able to give back today.
My mother worked hard as a carpenter and educator for most of the years I was growing up. But her income just wasn’t enough to pay for rent, food, childcare, and other basic needs.
Imagine what our nation would look like if we fully invested in the programs most of us need at one time or another rather than constantly fighting to keep the little we have.
Thankfully, she kept us fed with WIC (the Women, Infants, and Children nutrition assistance program), SNAP (then called “food stamps”), and frequent visits to food pantries. And after living in a shelter for the first three years of my life, we were able to get Section 8 housing.
But life continued to throw curve balls.
My mom suffered a stroke while pregnant with my brother, who was born prematurely in 2002. She had to relearn how to walk and talk—and my brother needed serious health interventions due to complications of his premature birth. Thankfully, we got some help from Social Security and Medicare.
All of these supports enabled me to get an education, get into college, and help my family.
When my mother’s health failed to the point that she was on dialysis, my 10-year-old little brother needed to be cared for. So I moved him halfway across the country to live with me. Suddenly, I was a student, a worker, and a young single caretaker.
My mother recently passed away. But thanks to her hard work and the help we got from public programs, I was able to get a master’s degree. After experiencing the vital importance of those programs, I knew I had to devote my life to helping others access the same assistance that had been life-saving for me and my family.
I now work at an organization in Indianapolis, where I help residents achieve their family goals through basic needs support, community engagement, and case management. Ultimately, we explore the barriers keeping families from economic stability and work with them to find solutions.
My little brother, meanwhile, is 21 and a trade school graduate. He’s gainfully employed as an aircraft cleaner at the local airport and a production associate at a manufacturing company. I’m so proud of all that we’ve been able to accomplish because help was there for us when we needed it.
Yet even as I tell my story, there are lawmakers who would cut affordable housing and rental assistance programs. They would slash nutrition programs and Medicaid. There are even lawmakers and cities who seek to criminalize homelessness, which has now gotten the attention of the Supreme Court.
The deep cuts to social programs the House majority has proposed would slash investments that are already insufficient. Due to the lack of affordable housing in this country, only 1 in 4 eligible families actually receive housing vouchers like my family relied on. These cuts would make it even harder.
Thanks to the help we got, we give back as good as we received and more—that’s how a healthy system works. If we help families survive rocky times rather than fall deeper into poverty, all of us benefit as a society. If we don’t, then millions of stories like mine won’t be possible.
Imagine what our nation would look like if we fully invested in the programs most of us need at one time or another rather than constantly fighting to keep the little we have. We shouldn’t be cutting our public programs—we should be expanding them.
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The US Needs Paid Parental and Medical Leave
Welcoming a child should never be the reason a family plunges into poverty, especially in one of the wealthiest countries in the world.
Feb 18, 2024
I had a baby in 2021 and quickly learned how parenting and child care expenses add up.
My husband and I had saved up for months to afford my unpaid maternity leave—I kept working even after my water broke because we needed every penny. It was a dream come true to have a career that I was proud of and finally be welcoming a child into our lives.
But I had no idea how hard it would really be.
While I was on unpaid maternity leave that cost us our health benefits, my husband was let go from his job. Already reliant on WIC—the federal food aid program for women, infants, and children—we were forced to go to food pantries, apply for Medicaid, and referred to a diaper bank. We were in survival mode: exhausted, stressed out, and worried.
Congress must put our tax dollars and policies toward strong support for families.
Despite a litany of postpartum complications that continue to plague me more than two years later, I ended up only taking seven weeks of leave before I returned to work out of desperation.
I wondered: Why doesn’t the U.S. have a paid parental leave policy?
Instead, my first and only experience with motherhood was marred by stress and trauma. Again and again, I had to choose between my health and a paycheck, which can feel like a punishment. I’d proudly served my country on a one-year assignment overseas working on foreign aid, and it didn’t matter.
We found child care at a loving, quality child care center, but the tuition kept increasing. Now the monthly cost is almost twice our mortgage. In fact, child care costs exceed college tuition where we live in North Carolina, as well as in at least 27 other states. My stomach gets in a knot every six months when I know the tuition will increase again.
I wondered: Why don’t we invest more in early care and education?
Meanwhile, the crises causing outsized harm to families throughout the pandemic compounded: a diaper shortage, a formula shortage, inflation, and wages that wouldn’t keep up. So many people are struggling to get back on their feet and desperately need balance and some peace of mind. The stress took its toll, and my husband and I separated in spring 2023.
I wondered: If only we’d had more support, would we have made it?
I have an advanced degree and work as a communications director at a nonprofit while also freelancing. After paying for necessities, we have nothing left, so I get food and supplies from neighbors and friends. I work so hard as a single mom to try to achieve the dreams I have for myself and my baby boy—the dreams that all mothers have. I don’t want my child to deal with the stress and constant refrain of “we don’t have the money for that,” like I did growing up.
Families desperately need, want, and deserve better. Welcoming a child should never be the reason a family plunges into poverty, especially in one of the wealthiest countries in the world. We shouldn’t be sacrificing health, quality early learning, or stability in exchange for a roof over our heads and food. Instead, we should be building strong foundations and generational wealth for our kids.
We need federally mandated paid parental and medical leave. We need additional dedicated funding for programs like WIC that support over 6 million families.
And we need to continue expanding the Child Tax Credit. In North Carolina alone, the monthly Child Tax Credits received in 2021 helped the families of 140,000 children lift themselves out of poverty. Nationally, the credit cut child poverty by over 40% before Congress let the pandemic expansion expire at the end of 2021.
Congress must put our tax dollars and policies toward strong support for families. Let’s ensure no parent experiences welcoming a child as a financial catastrophe and make this country a place where families prosper.
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$95 Billion More for War, But No to $1 Billion to Feed 2 Million Families?
"In the view of the administration and a majority of members of Congress, some emergencies count more than others," wrote one policy analyst.
Feb 15, 2024
Following the passage of a $95 billion foreign aid package that includes funding for Israel's relentless assault on Gaza, economists and policy experts this week are expressing alarm over the failure of the U.S. Congress to ensure a federal program for low-income parents and their babies is fully funded—a gap that could leave 2 million children and parents without sufficient food.
The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) has never turned away eligible families in its 50-year history, but analysts say that with Congress deadlocked over whether to fully fund the program, states may soon be forced to place up to 2 million families on waiting lists—"jeopardizing access to this highly effective program during an important window for child development," the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities said in December.
The program, which has been linked to a decrease in infant and maternal mortality in the past five decades, is currently being funded by a short-term continuing resolution (CR) that Congress passed in January to keep the government running until early March.
While lawmakers have not agreed on funding for WIC, which is estimated to cost $6.3 billion in 2024 and faces a $1 billion shortfall, the Senate on Tuesday did pass the $95 billion foreign aid package, including $14.1 billion for Israel.
Israel's bombardment of Gaza has killed more than 28,000 people since October, including more than 12,000 children.
The Senate's 70-29 bipartisan vote in favor of the package, wrote defense analyst William Hartung of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, "lays bare the skewed priorities of the federal government."
"Despite deep divisions, it is possible to get bipartisan support for a package that mostly involves funding weapons exports," Hartung wrote at Forbes on Wednesday. "Don't expect any such emergency measure to address record levels of homelessness, or aid the 1 in 6 American children living in poverty, or accelerate investments in curbing the climate crisis. In the view of the administration and a majority of members of Congress, some emergencies count more than others."
At the Institute for Policy Studies, National Priorities Project director Lindsay Koshgarian pointed to WIC as a prime example of the kind of program the federal government should be prioritizing over military aid for Israel, which has garnered growing condemnation from U.S. allies for its indiscriminate attacks on civilians.
"There's huge discrepancies in where the resources are going," Koshgarian told Al Jazeera on Wednesday. "It's an incredibly important program, there are many families that have depended on it. $1 billion to make up the shortfall would be easy to come up with."
Last week, Democrats on the U.S. House Education and Workforce Committee warned congressional leaders that they must ensure full funding for WIC, which "currently serves over half of all infants born in the country and continues to be a lifesaving nutrition intervention program that minimizes avoidable health and developmental issues for low-income, nutritionally at-risk women, infants, and children."
"To prevent any disruption to a program that is crucial to supporting new parents and young children, it is vital that WIC is fully funded and continues to align with projected participation and food costs," wrote the lawmakers.
The 19th reported last month that state WIC agencies are currently spending money "assuming the needed funds will eventually be appropriated."
"By early March," wrote journalist Amanda Becker, "the fiscal year will already be half over, so there will be a shorter window of time to make up any budget shortfall, potentially leading to more people being waitlisted en masse than if the shortfall was spread across a full fiscal year."
At Forbes, Hartung called on the federal government to "put less emphasis on war planning and military buildups and more on reassurance and dialogue designed to set clear rules of the road and avoid a conflict."
"If peace in the Middle East is truly a goal of this administration," he wrote, "a radical shift in priorities is urgently needed."
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2 Million Children, Parents Set to Lose Food Aid Unless Congress Acts Now
"Republicans are refusing to fully fund the programs families desperately need, and now 2 million new parents, babies, and children could pay the price," warned one advocate.
Jan 17, 2024
As U.S. lawmakers finalize this year's government funding bills amid yet another shutdown threat, progressive advocates on Wednesday warned that Congress must act immediately to ensure the uninterrupted flow of food aid from a key program on which millions of children and their parents depend.
Advocates including U.S. Congressional Progressive Caucus Chair Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) and Rep. Cori Bush (D-Mo.) rallied outside the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. Wednesday to implore lawmakers to pass a clean budget without cuts to programs like the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC), Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), and Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP).
"Programs like WIC, TANF, and SNAP are essential tools for ending poverty and hunger. But instead of helping Democrats expand these programs and deliver for working families, Republicans are constantly working to CUT them in favor of tax breaks for the wealthy," Jayapal said on social media. "It's shameful."
Rep. Lori Trahan (D-Mass.)
warned that "Republicans are forcing us to the brink of a shutdown for the third time in four months," and that "shutdowns don't affect the donor class, but they're devastating for service members who need their paychecks, moms who need WIC to feed their kids, and families trying to heat their homes."
The group ParentsTogether Action specifically warned of threats to WIC, which "ensures access to fresh and healthy food and formula, breastfeeding support, and healthcare referrals for pregnant and postpartum parents and their kids up to age 5."
The group stressed:
It is critical that [congressional lawmakers] meet President [Joe] Biden's emergency request to fully fund WIC, and honor a long-standing commitment to ensure WIC is able to serve every low-income family who seeks assistance. If they fail to do so by January 19, the program will face a roughly $1 billion shortfall in 2024, which would require states to reduce WIC participation. Up to 2 million eligible young children and pregnant and postpartum adults with low incomes could be turned away by September, resulting in wait lists for the first time in decades.
According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA)—which runs WIC via the Food and Nutrition Service—the program served approximately 6.3 million parents and children each month during fiscal year 2022, including nearly 40% of all infants in the United States. More than half of all U.S. newborns are eligible for WIC benefits.
A 2023 ParentsTogether Action survey revealed that:
- 64% of WIC recipients would have been unable to afford necessary formula to feed their infants without the program;
- 52% of recipients would have been unable to afford enough food for themselves;
- 75% of beneficiaries said the program helped them afford nutritious foods that they would not have otherwise been able to purchase; and
- 35% of those receiving benefits said they would not have had the support necessary to breastfeed their children.
As Stacie Sanchez Hare, director of No Kid Hungry Texas, argued Wednesday in an an opinion piece in The San Antonio Express News, the threat to WIC "comes at the worst possible time," as "the latest USDA report on food insecurity in the United States showed more than 13 million children are living with hunger—a 44% increase in a single year."
That's roughly 1 in 5 children in the U.S., with Black, Latino, rural, and single-parent households disproportionately affected.
"Republicans are refusing to fully fund the programs families desperately need, and now 2 million new parents, babies, and children could pay the price," said ParentsTogether Action executive director Ailen Arreaza. "If Congress doesn't act immediately, new parents struggling to buy food and formula for their families will be turned away."
"Congress cannot abandon pregnant people, new parents, and newborn babies and allow them to go hungry," Arreaza added. "They must fully fund WIC without delay."
Last year saw the ignominious end of a yearslong trend of declining hunger in the U.S., an improvement due largely to federal policies like the expanded child tax credit and universal school meals. The expiration—or Republican blockage—of pandemic-era food programs fueled a resurgence of hunger across the nation.
"With rising food costs and increased program participation—and with data showing that funding WIC bolsters our local economy—it is more critical than ever that we also strengthen WIC to provide vital nutrition, formula, and breastfeeding support for pregnant women, postpartum moms, infants, and toddlers in our communities," wrote Holladay, Utah resident Miriam Belgique in a Wednesday letter to The Salt Lake Tribune.
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When Poverty Is a Policy Choice, the Safety Net Must Be Defended
Lawmakers have allowed life-saving programs collapse and poor families like mine are the ones paying the price. It's time to fight back.
Dec 04, 2023
As a 32 year-old mother, I understand the extreme challenges my single mom faced better than ever. But I’ve also seen the life-changing difference a strong social safety net can make.
Above all, I’ve learned that poverty is a policy choice, not a personal one. We can reverse it — if we choose.
I grew up poor and lost my mother to suicide when I was just 14. Mostly homeless, I floated between sofas, cars, and the streets for years. Eventually I got food stamps, which were a tremendous help. With help from a friend, I got a job as a supervisor at an insurance company. And with help from a county program, my partner and I were able to secure an apartment.
Lawmakers and middle-class voters need to understand that poor people work as hard as humanly possible. We have families, we go to school, we access every resource we can find. It takes tremendous mental strength to survive poverty.
At nearly 30, it was my first real break from homelessness. Then the pandemic hit and I lost my job. But thankfully, we received the expanded Child Tax Credit for my partner’s children and other income supports that helped us stay in our apartment.
Then my partner hit, too. When the abuse began, I had to flee.
It was a challenging time, but the expansion of the safety net in the early days of the Biden administration offered hope. Even as I was trying to find a new job and place to live — and hiding from my abuser — the pandemic assistance made it possible for me to do that.
My story isn’t unique. The investments in the American Rescue Plan, including the expanded Child Tax Credit, reduced poverty and unemployment to record lows, kept small businesses afloat, avoided a recession, and staved off hunger. Nearly 40 million families — including over 60 million children — were helped, and child poverty was cut nearly in half.
Unfortunately, lawmakers let these programs expire. And now those gains are being reversed — poverty made a record jump last year.
Now I have a baby and my resources are thin. My landlord threatens me with eviction nearly every month. I’ve borrowed money. I’ve searched for every church, every charity, and every government resource so I can feed, clothe, and house my baby. You won’t find more resourceful people than mothers trying to feed their children.
But with our shredded safety net, it’s not enough — for me or many others. Average rents are unaffordable for working families across the country, and where I live there’s a 12-15 year waiting list for Section 8 housing. Nationally, a child care funding cliff is expected to close over 70,000 child care centers nationwide unless lawmakers act.
And the hardline conservatives now running the House are threatening to cut even more programs, like Women, Infants and Children (WIC) benefits, that parents like me rely on.
Lawmakers and middle-class voters need to understand that poor people work as hard as humanly possible. We have families, we go to school, we access every resource we can find. It takes tremendous mental strength to survive poverty.
I don’t want other mothers to suffer — I want more for my child and theirs. And together, we can win it.
I found an advocacy organization called Parent Voices and began volunteering with them. I learned how to help other poor people advocate for better child care and budgets that prioritize children and families. I feel more empowered and hopeful now.
I’ve come to see that though life is a struggle, it’s a beautiful struggle when we all come together to make the change we want to see. Now we need lawmakers to hear our voices.
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House GOP Wants to Take Food Assistance Away From More Than 1 Million Low-Income People
The proposed SNAP amendments, which would take away food assistance that helps people with low incomes get enough to eat, would hurt many people and put them at risk of going hungry.
Sep 26, 2023
As part of the Agriculture appropriations bill for fiscal year 2024 that the House is considering this week, the House Rules Committee has allowed three amendments to be offered that would take Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits away from more than 1.3 million individuals with low incomes, based on Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates. Those whose food assistance would be taken away include veterans, individuals experiencing homelessness, young adults who were in foster care as children, and people who live in areas with relatively high unemployment. Policymakers should reject these harmful amendments if they come up for a vote.
The Rules Committee also added a provision to the bill that would cut virtually every program under the bill by more than 14 percent. These changes would take food away from older adults and families by cutting funding for:
- The Commodity Supplemental Food Program, which provides supplemental food to about 700,000 older adults;
- The Emergency Food Assistance Program administrative funding, which supports the transportation, storage, and distribution of U.S. Department of Agriculture foods distributed through food banks and other emergency feeding organizations; and
- The WIC and Senior Farmers’ Market Nutrition programs, which provide more than 1 million women and children participating in the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) and 80,000 older adults with benefits to purchase food at farmers markets.
While the Rules Committee excluded WIC from the across-the-board cut, the underlying bill would nonetheless significantly shortchange and make harmful changes to the program, as we have explained.
The proposed SNAP amendments, which would take away food assistance that helps people with low incomes get enough to eat, would hurt many people and put them at risk of going hungry.
These amendments would further expand the number of people subject to SNAP’s long-standing harmful — and failed — work-reporting requirement. That policy takes away food assistance from non-disabled adults aged 18-49 without children in their home after just three months if they cannot document they are working or participating in a job training program for 20 hours per week or that they qualify for an exemption.
Numerous studies have shown that this requirement causes harm by taking food assistance away from people who need it, and that it doesn’t increase employment.
After being temporarily suspended during the pandemic, the work-reporting requirement returned in most areas of the country this summer. As a result, at least 500,000 of the nation’s lowest-income adults will be cut off SNAP beginning next week, after they reach the three-month limit.
Numerous studies have shown that this requirement causes harm by taking food assistance away from people who need it, and that it doesn’t increase employment.
Under the current policy, people who are between jobs, who have health conditions or caregiving responsibilities that impede work at least temporarily, whose work hours fluctuate, or who face challenges navigating the red tape of states’ reporting and exemption systems often lose the food assistance they need to buy groceries. Expanding this policy would worsen already wide racial disparities in hunger by punishing people who already face structural barriers due to racism. It would similarly punish people who face other forms of discrimination, such as women and people with disabilities.
One amendment from Rep. Garret Graves would renege on the agreement made on SNAP in the June bipartisan debt ceiling agreement. That law temporarily expanded SNAP’s work-reporting requirement to adults up to age 55, putting an estimated 750,000 adults aged 50-54 at risk of losing food assistance, but it also provided new temporary exemptions from the work requirement for veterans, people experiencing homelessness, and former foster youth up to age 24. These new exemptions recognize the challenges people in these groups face in meeting work-reporting requirements and the impact that having their food assistance taken away can have.
That amendment from Graves would eliminate the new temporary exemptions, which protect SNAP benefits for about 300,000 people, based on CBO’s estimates of the debt ceiling agreement, while leaving in place the expansion of the work-reporting requirement to older adults.
The other two amendments (a second amendment from Graves and another from Rep. Eric Burlison) would take away flexibility that every state has used at some point. Under SNAP’s current rules, states can request a waiver to temporarily suspend the work-reporting requirement in areas with a documented lack of jobs under a limited set of standards that have been the same for 25 years. The second Graves amendment would limit area waivers from the work-reporting requirement to counties with unemployment rates over 10 percent. Only nine counties that currently receive waivers would continue to qualify. The Burlison amendment would eliminate all such waivers for areas with high unemployment.
Similar changes to the existing work requirement waivers proposed by Rep. Dusty Johnson in a separate bill (H.R. 1581) would cut SNAP by $30 to $40 billion over ten years, CBO has estimated. That translates to more than 1 million people being cut from SNAP in a typical month under the similar Graves and Burlison amendments. Among the harsh impacts of these proposed changes, states would no longer be able to waive the work-reporting requirement on tribal lands where there are a lack of jobs.
Moreover, these amendments would eliminate a waiver criterion that is tied to extended unemployment benefits, which are triggered when states experience a sharp increase in unemployment, usually at the start of a recession. This would curtail SNAP’s role as an automatic stabilizer during downturns and would exacerbate the harm of a recession because individuals losing their source of income would qualify for temporary food assistance for just three months if they couldn’t find work, while periods of joblessness during recessions often last much longer.
Policymakers should reject these three amendments that could lead to over 1 million low-income households losing SNAP and facing greater hunger and the steep cuts the bill would make to WIC.
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When a Poverty Surge Is the Path Chosen by Lawmakers
Poverty is solvable. We know what works. All we have to do is act.
Sep 14, 2023
After hitting a record low of 7.8 percent in 2021, new data shows the government’s Supplemental Poverty Measure jumped to 12.4 percent last year. That’s a nearly 60 percent increase. And it’s all because politicians allowed proven income support programs to expire.
I’m an expert on poverty. I’ve lived it most of my life in Iowa. I studied it as a Bill Emerson National Hunger Fellow in rural West Virginia and in Washington, D.C.. And now I help people experiencing poverty across the country tell their own stories to change policy.
People can pull themselves up by their bootstraps, get an education, and work multiple jobs. But in the face of rising prices, low wages, high rents, and a broken healthcare system, it’s often not enough. Without a safety net and a level playing field for families, financial security is often out of reach.
When I was growing up in Des Moines, my mom had a stable job with the state, but her pay wasn’t enough for a real home for my two siblings and me. Iowa, like every state, has a low-income housing crisis. And families of color like mine experience greater challenges obtaining affordable housing. We bounced around shelters, churches, and motel rooms.
Despite a stigma about accepting public assistance, we benefited from SNAP (aka “food stamps”) and the Women, Infants and Children (WIC) program. But like other low-income families, we had to navigate the “benefits cliff.” When my mother made just $10 more, we’d lose the benefits we needed for sufficient, regular meals.
My father suffered from opioid addiction. When he was eventually able to get stable employment and rejoin our family, we finally got an apartment where the schools were decent. But a brain aneurysm suddenly took his life and we ended up back on the opposite side of the city where the underfunded schools offered less opportunity.
I wanted to stay in my school, so I spent four hours a day commuting on public buses and on foot. I knew I needed to get into college to be able to help my family financially. Now I have a steady job, and so does my husband.
But everyday struggles don’t end. The brokenness of our healthcare system burst into my life again when our baby was born with a fatal condition. The medical costs ran nearly $1 million in just the first few months of his tragically short life.
What could prepare someone for that?
Thankfully, my employer pays 100 percent of my health insurance. That’s a rarity. If I’d been out of work or worked elsewhere, we would’ve gone bankrupt as we suffered the most tragic thing that could ever happen to us as parents.
These are just a few of the structural obstacles low-income people face every day. But there are solutions. The advocates I work with reported enormous relief after politicians finally agreed to invest in helping children and families during the COVID-19 crisis.
The expanded Child Tax Credit cut child poverty nearly in half. Expanded food programs through SNAP lifted more than 3 million people out of poverty and staved off an expected spike in hunger. Housing subsidies kept nearly 2.5 million people out of poverty and in their homes. And Medicaid enrollment protections reduced the number of uninsured people by 1.5 million.
The year those programs were implemented, the Supplemental Poverty Measure fell to 7.8 percent — its lowest ever level. But when politicians rejected continuing this vital help for families, it increased by a record amount.
This is a failure for families across the country. We need to renew and expand those programs as soon as possible.
Poverty is solvable. We know what works. Why don’t we do it?
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GOP Threaten to Rip Nutrition Benefits From Over 5 Million of Nation's Poor Children and Parents
With time running out, Congress must ensure that the final appropriations bill fully funds WIC to avoid eligible families losing access to the program’s critical benefits.
Sep 12, 2023
Funding in fiscal year 2024 Senate and House appropriations bills for the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) falls far short of what is needed to provide all eligible families who apply with the full nutrition assistance benefit. Across the states, these proposed funding levels would result in WIC turning away 600,000 eligible new parents and young children, and the House bill would sharply cut benefits for another 4.7 million. (See table below for state-by-state estimates.) Congress must ensure that the final appropriations bill fully funds WIC to avoid eligible families losing access to the program’s critical benefits.
WIC provides critical nutrition benefits, breastfeeding support, and other vital services to low-income pregnant and postpartum people, infants, and young children under age 5 who are at nutritional risk. In recognition of WIC’s positive impacts on health and developmental outcomes, policymakers have adhered to a bipartisan commitment for more than 25 years to provide the program sufficient funding to serve all eligible applicants.
Yet without substantial funding above the Senate bill level, we estimate that 600,000 eligible people nationwide — primarily toddlers, preschoolers, and postpartum adults — would be turned away from WIC, as we explained yesterday.
The funding bill proposed by House Republicans is far worse. In total, it would cut WIC benefits for, or take them away altogether from, roughly 5.3 million people with low incomes. Not only would it also result in roughly 600,000 eligible people nationwide being turned away from WIC, but it would weaken the program’s science-based benefits by sharply reducing the fruit and vegetable benefit that was increased two years ago on the recommendation of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.
As a result, an additional 4.7 million toddlers and preschoolers and pregnant, postpartum, and breastfeeding participants would be left with only $11 to $15 per month to purchase healthy produce, depending on the participant category — representing a 56 to 70 percent cut compared to current levels.
The table soon on this page illustrates how many people in each state could be turned away from WIC, or have their benefits slashed, without funding above what the Senate and House bills would provide. It is critical that Congress include in the final funding law the amount needed for WIC to provide current food benefits to all eligible families who apply or need to renew, so states won’t have to turn away eligible new parents or toddlers during critical periods of development.
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GOP Shutdown Threat Raises Risk of 'Inhumane' Cuts to Food Aid
"House Republicans are listening to their most extreme members on steps that could slow the flow of relief and put us to the brink of a government shutdown," warned Democratic Rep. Rosa DeLauro.
Sep 04, 2023
Republican threats to shut down the federal government if spending isn't drastically cut have put funding for a critical nutrition aid program at risk as hunger grows across the nation, with the recent lapse of pandemic-era assistance leaving many low-income families struggling to put food on the table.
The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, commonly known as WIC, is one of many federal programs that could face severe impacts if Congress fails to fund the government by September 30.
As The Washington Post's Tony Romm reported Sunday, "While USDA technically can operate WIC if federal funding lapses, states could only continue paying benefits for as long as they had leftover money."
"A shutdown at the end of 2018 into the following January, for example, brought some states within a month of having to cut benefits, institute waitlists, or take other drastic actions," Romm noted, citing a Washington state nutrition official. "Nearly a decade later, state leaders and nutrition experts fear the fight in the nation's capital once again could leave millions of women and children in a financial bind."
WIC, long a target of Republican lawmakers, gives states grants to provide nutrition aid and other assistance to pregnant and postpartum adults and children up to the age of five. House Republican appropriators have proposed sharp cuts to WIC for the coming fiscal year, even as policy experts say a significant funding increase is needed as participation in the program grows.
In a recent report, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) warned that up to 750,000 eligible toddlers, preschoolers, postpartum adults, and others eligible for WIC could be turned away from the program if the House GOP's proposed funding levels become law.
"Another 4.6 million toddlers and preschoolers and pregnant, postpartum, and breastfeeding participants would have their benefits cut significantly," the group estimated. "In total, the House bill would cut food assistance for, or take it away altogether from, roughly 5.3 million young children and pregnant, postpartum, and breastfeeding adults."
CBPP argued that the program will need roughly $7.3 billion in total funding for fiscal year 2024 to provide full benefits to WIC recipients. Republicans, who already secured more strict work requirements for SNAP recipients in a debt ceiling deal with the White House, want to approve just $5.5 billion for WIC.
In an effort to stave off disaster, the Biden White House last week urged the divided Congress to pass a short-term government funding measure that includes $1.4 billion in additional funding for WIC.
Romm emphasized Sunday that "the request hinges on House Republicans, who recently have tried to slash WIC funding in a move that could spell cuts to poor Americans' monthly nutritional support."
The White House estimates that the GOP's proposed WIC cuts "could reduce monthly fruit and vegetable benefits by 70% for pregnant women and 56% for children, while potentially forcing 1.9 million participants onto a waitlist for aid," Romm added.
The far-right House Freedom Caucus, which has dozens of members, has threatened to oppose any short-term funding agreement that does not impose steep cuts to federal spending and put an end to the "unprecedented weaponization" of the Justice Department, an apparent reference to the prosecution of former President Donald Trump.
The House, led by Republican Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), is set to return from August recess next week. As CNN reported Sunday, "GOP hardliners in the House are eager to play a game of chicken over the end-of-the-month deadline to fund federal agencies, seeking to force the White House and Senate to make a choice: Accept a slew of conservative priorities or risk a debilitating government shutdown."
Republican appropriators have called for major cuts to a range of federal programs related to education, environmental protection, and more.
Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), the top Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, wrote on social media over the weekend that "House Democrats are ready to move on funding for disaster relief and other crises."
"House Republicans," she added, "are listening to their most extreme members on steps that could slow the flow of relief and put us to the brink of a government shutdown."
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