House Agriculture Democrats, Stakeholders Speak Out Against $230 Billion Cut to Food Assistance

Okay, good morning everyone. Thank you all for coming. I'm so grateful to see so many folks here out for this very important topic. Uh we have some members who are in uh committee hearing. So they'll be joining us here momentarily. Uh specifically the uh ranking member of the nutrition subcommittee, Johanna Hayes will be here and we'll work her in just as soon as she can get out of her hearing. So, I want to say thank you especially to Yolanda, Carara, Megan, and Cat for being here, who will be sharing their stories uh in just a moment. I think the most important part of this press conference this morning is for all of you to hear directly from uh the people who would be impacted by these SNAP cuts. You know, I recently held a series of town halls in five of my Republicans uh congressional uh districts around the state of Minnesota. And I talked with a whole lot of anxious people. They're worried about the economy and the direction of our country. They're worried about Republicans taking their health care as well as food assistance. Almost $1 trillion dollar is the target for cuts to SNAP and Medicaid in this reconciliation budget process. And this is at a time when Americans are dealing with higher costs to their own budgets. At this moment in time, Republicans are cutting the heart out of programs that help people in America meet their basic needs, like affording food and affording healthcare. Let us be clear, it does not matter how my Republican colleagues try to spend this. Cutting SNAP by $230 billion dollars will result in children, seniors, veterans, and disabled Americans going without food. It's also terrible, by the way, for the farm economy. I represent Minnesota's second congressional district and every summer, thank you for that. The second district is covered in corn and soybeans. Right now in this country, farmers are already dealing with high input costs, low prices, and one of the most devastating trade wars in American history. Farmers need a bipartisan five-year farm bill. And these cuts to the SNAP program, which by the way, the nutrition title is part of the farm bill coalition, will make it much, much harder for us to get a five-year farm bill across the finish line. A cut of this magnitude would cut about $30 billion in actual farm income for farmers and also threaten $380,000 jobs across the entire food supply chain. That means jobs at grocery stores, at warehouses, at trucking companies, and on farms. Because when you spend a dollar on SNAP, you're helping to pay the wages of the grocery store clerk who stocked the shelf, the trucker who delivered the food, the manufacturer who made the packaging, and the farmer who grew it. This is all one integrated supply chain. So, let me be clear about what we're talking about here. $2 per meal, an average of $6 a day. That's the average SNAP benefit for an American in need. And before we get to the markup, let me also just say SNAP already has work requirements in it. Life is tough enough right now. We shouldn't be forcing American families to go through it on an empty stomach. We should be working to make these programs better, not taking food assistance from seniors living on fixed incomes when they're already already struggling with higher prices. I want to thank my colleagues here today and Yolanda, Carara, Megan, and Cat. I think the American people need to hear the true cost of losing access to these basic needs programs. And with that, I'll turn the mic over to Vice Ranking Member of the full committee, Shantel Brown. Thank you. And good morning. I am Congresswoman Shantel Brown, vice ranking member on the Agriculture Committee, and proud to represent Northeast Ohio. I'd like to thank Ranking Member Craig for organizing this press conference. I'm honored to stand here with my colleagues who you'll hear from, Congresswoman Hayes, Congresswoman Vazquez, and Congresswoman Bazinski. I'm even more excited to be here along with the storytellers because so often what happens in Congress almost gets reduced to a game. Winners and losers, votes and numbers. But this isn't a game. And what ranking member Craig and all of us are pointing out is that you cannot enact cuts on this level that the House Republicans want without having a real impact on real people. This is going to be bad for farmers. This is going to be bad for families and this is going to be bad for the country. In my district in Ohio, one in five households rely on SNAP, including one in three black households. I represent so many people like ones you'll hear from today, Yolanda and Megan. people in my family, people I grew up with, people I go to church with, people that need this program to put food on the table. And I would challenge my Republican colleagues to look them in the eye and say their benefits are too generous. They think $6 a day is too much. What should it be? $5, $4? especially when we are going to see grocery prices increase due to Trump's tariffs and trade war. And I think that it's simply appalling that we're going to increase hunger and deepen poverty in this country so that we can do what? Give tax cuts to the ultra wealthy. Call it a ripoff. Call it a scam. Call it bait and switch. Call it what you want. But we are going to fight this every step of the way. This is not Thank you. This is not what the American people asked for and it's not what they want. And the fact that they have delayed this markup in this committee is a sign that Republicans know that. So there is nothing fiscally responsible about making hungry and making people suffer, making more people hungry and making more people suffer just to hand out billionaire tax cuts. I know my colleagues have a lot to say as well. So with that, I want to introduce my good friend, the gentle lady from Connecticut, ranking member on the nutrition subcommittee, Congresswoman Jana Hayes, or the not so gentle. Definitely a lady, but not so gentle. Not when it comes to this issue. Thank you so much for being here today and thank you to Ranking Member Craig for convening this press conference on an issue that we have been talking about for years. Protecting SNAP and making sure that we are not taking food out of the mouths of hungry children, of seniors, of veterans, of disabled Americans, of working people. I think that it's evident by the fact that we're out here and not in a markup that Republicans are feeling the pressure of the impacts of these harmful cuts that their proposals are wildly unpopular and deeply hurtful to the American people. And I also think that it is critically important that we understand that these are not just numbers. These are people. These are family. These are meals. These are children. House Democrats have sta are standing strong to protect these benefits to make sure that there is no reduce or loss of benefits to families who rely on them. We are trying to amplify and make sure that the American people understand that there is no way to get to 230 billion without cutting SNAP. So this is a non-starter for us. This is a non-starter for us. We stand ready and willing to come to the table to work with our Republican counterparts to produce a farm bill that helps farmers and families and feeds Americans. All of the things that we have been able to do time and time again. But doing that at the expense of American people at the expense of American households and livelihoods is a non-starter. We're open to having any conversation that they want about how we improve programs like SNAP, how we deliver more food to more people, how we keep more farmers growing. We're open to that. We're open to discussing solutions for eliminating waste, which is a big concern for them. No Democrat supports any kind of waste. All of us want our federal programs to be as efficient and effective as possible so that we can serve the most people as we can and be good stewards of American taxpayer dollars. But that cannot happen at the expense of taking food off of people's tables. Every single time we approach a budget conversation, whether it was the debt ceiling or the CR and now reconciliation, there is always targeted attacks on SNAP. If my position has not been clear on this, I want to reiterate that once again, I will not I will not vote for any bill any bill that makes more people, not less, hungry in this country. These are policy choices and we are policy makers. We have the ability to directly improve these programs and that's what I'm here to do and that's what House Democrats are doing on this committee. So again, thank you so much for your advocacy. Thank you for bringing attention to this issue. Thank you for helping the American people to understand the impact not just of votes, not just of legislation, but the impact on people and communities of these harmful cuts. And I think that our storytellers that are here today will further amplify that and illustrate what the face of a person on SNAP looks like, what the benefit to families feels like. It is not people that are just out to game the system as you would be led to believe. It is real people and real families who work hard every day who contribute to their communities who are living out their American dream and just need a little bit of help. And that's what House Democrats are here to do. So again, thank you. And with that, I'd like to welcome another member, fierce advocate for for families and communities, a member of the House ad committee, Nikki Bazinski from Illinois's 13th Congressional District. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Ranking Member Hayes, and thank you to Ranking Member Craig for bringing us together today. Um, as you know, SNAP is a lifeline for families across this country. Let's been that's been made crystal clear here today, not just in Democratic districts, but in places all across this country in some of the deepest red districts. You'd think that House Republicans would be banding together to protect this lifeline for their constituents to show them that they're fighting to protect these programs and make it easier to put food on their tables. But you'd be wrong. Instead, they are ma are pushing for a massive $230 billion cut to SNAP in order to pay for tax giveaways to billionaires. But that's because it's but that because it's massive. It captures just how devastating it will be for families, farmers, and entire industries across this country. It's just not about reducing food assistance for a single bomb in Springfield, Illinois or communities in the Metro East that I represent. That impact the impacts of these cuts will ripple far across the kitchen table. What does it mean when you cut $230 billion from SNAP? It means $230 billion less for grocery stores, manufacturing plants, truck drivers, as Representative Craig mentioned, and most critically in my district, farmers. SNAP doesn't just give away money. It powers part of our economy. A new analysis from the National Grocerers Association found that SNAP generated over $4.5 billion dollar in federal, state, and local tax receipts in just 2024. The program supports about 388,000 jobs at grocery stores, warehouses, trucking companies, farms, and more. This contributes over 20 billion dollar in direct wages. The agriculture economy, which powers many of our rural communities, would be severely weakened by these cuts. Grocery stores are going to have less and less money to stay running, and that means that less money in their pockets for their crops. This could cut this could result in $30 billion in lost income for farmers. I know many of these farmers and I've met with them in recent weeks, and I would tell you they are scared. Farmers take pride in feeding their communities, in getting their hands dirty, and working hard, knowing that the food they are growing gets to children and parents in need. With all of the economic uncertainty facing America right now, do we need to cut farm income by $30 billion? We're dealing with trade wars that threaten to devastate soybean farmers in my district. We've got high input costs, everything from seeds to fuel. And in some cases, it's impossible for farmers to make a decent living. Add to that the low prices that don't even cover the cost of production, and you've got a perfect storm. Cutting SNAP isn't just a hit to the most vulnerable in our society. It's a hit to the heart of our rural communities. It's a blow to grocery stores, as I said, truck drivers, and to everyone who is a part of this food system. and it's going to hurt our farmers who are already operating on razor thin margins. So, let's be clear, these cuts don't take food away, don't just take food away from families. They take away $30 billion in farm income. They put tens of thousands of jobs at risk and they drag down the very communities that are already fighting to get by. We can't afford to make these cuts. Our families, our farmers, and our economy deserve better. Thank you very much. And I'm going to turn it back over to member Craig. Thank you. Thank you, Representative Bzinski. Let me also say thank you to my colleagues who are here in solidarity or who have been here. I saw uh Representative Salude Carbajal here. Um ranking uh ranking member of the of subcommittee. Uh Joel Takuda is here. Jonathan Jackson has joined us. Uh April Mlan Delaney is back there. Did I miss anybody? Thank you so much for coming. in solidarity with us today. And especially, I want to say thank you to Nikki, uh, Janna, and Shantel for laying out what is at risk, uh, for us here. It's an honor to be in this fight, uh, with every single one of you. So, uh, now I'm going to turn the program over uh, to uh, Yolanda, Cara, Megan, and Cat. They're not some numbers on a spreadsheet. They're real people with real lives. And I, as someone whose family needed nutrition assistance myself when I was a child, am not a number. I'm incredibly thankful they are here today to share their stories with us. And Yolanda, we're going to start with you. The floor is yours. [Applause] Good morning. My name is Yolanda Gordon and I'm from South Carolina. I'm a veteran, a mother, and like many families, my family relied on SNAP to survive. While serving in the military, my small family depended on SNAP to keep food on the table. Later, as a divorced mom of three, two of my children are on the autism spectrum. I couldn't work full-time. There were no specialized child care options to meet my children's needs. We struggled, but SNAP helped fill the gap. It kept us fed. It kept us from falling deeper into poverty. Because of that support, I was able to raise my kids, meet their needs, and earn two college degrees. I am the return. Thank you. I am the return on investment that no one talks about. To the members of Congress who speak of their faith, I want to say this. Matthew 25:35 does not say, "When I was hungry, you gave me work requirements and time limits before I could eat." It says, "I was hungry and you gave me something to eat." If your faith guides your decisions, then let it guide you here. Food is a basic human right. And cutting snap isn't just bad policy. It's morally indefensible. Thank you. [Applause] That's fantastic. And next up, I'd like to introduce Megan, who's going to share her story as well. Good morning. My name is Megan Hollinger and I am a proud member of Mom's Rising. I am a single mom to four wonderful kids, ages five, seven, 12, and 15. We live in Marlington, West Virginia. I work as a community engagement specialist supporting people with mental health and addiction issues. I'm also a student working towards my bachelor's in social work. I'm here today because I'm deeply alarmed by Republican proposals to slash SNAP, which is critical for my family and millions of others. Thank you for the chance to share my story. I work full-time, but my wages aren't high, and my family struggles to make ends meet. I carefully budget every dollar to make sure I can keep the lights on, buy groceries, and pay bills. Trying to make all the pieces fit together can be enormously stressful. SNAP has been a critical source of support for my family for a long time. It's the reason I can feed my kids. SNAP also helps me afford healthier food options like fresh produce and protein, so I don't have to rely on um the cheap processed foods that really don't provide nutrition to my children. Right now, things are looking up for my family. When I finish my degree this fall, it will significantly boost my income. I'm also getting married in the fall, and I'm hopeful, thank you, that by the end of this year, my family will no longer rely on SNAP for the first time in many years. But we could not have made it to this point if it hadn't been available when we needed it. But now, Republicans are threatening to strip away the support so that they can hand breaks to billionaires and giant corporations. That is an outrage. Slashing SNAP would be nothing short of devastating for families like mine. We're already struggling as the cost of food continues to skyrocket, especially in rural communities like ours, where food must be trucked over the mountains to get into our small grocery stores. Right now in my community, a dozen eggs cost $8 and three chicken breasts ran $16 the last time I went shopping. I used to be able to stretch my SNAP benefits to last the whole month. But these days, I'm lucky if they last two weeks. Over and over again, it feels like moms, especially low-income moms, are left to just figure it out amid systemic changes like rising health care, child care, and food costs. I know what it's like to pick up extra shifts on the weekends or over the summer. Parents in my community can tell you what it feels like to skip meals so their child can have a birthday party. We'll go to great lengths to protect our kids from the enormous stress that we're shouldering. But moms are tired. We're tired of feeling like we don't have the support of our elected leaders who are supposed to represent us. We're tired of feeling like billionaires wants seem to always come before families needs. We're tired of having to defend basic supports that help families get by. It feels like Republican lawmakers don't understand that SNAP recipients power our economy. SNAP recipients are people who care for our children, the folks who serve our food, grocery store clerks, and gas station attendees. All the folks who were deemed essential just a few years ago when COVID hit. So slashing SNAP would have farreaching consequences, not just for families, but for our communities, our businesses, and our economy. It will force families in poverty into even more desperate situations. And I know from my work in mental health that it will drive up rates of crime, addiction, and homelessness. Moms will fight these cruel cuts. Billionaires don't need more tax breaks. And we don't need more burdensome work requirements for SNAP, which will only push people in difficult situations like those juggling caregiving responsibilities. Struggling because our country's child care crisis or facing health crisis of their own. Moms are counting on lawmakers to put families over billionaires and protect SNAP in the next budget package. Thank you. [Applause] Wow, that was truly incredible. Uh, next up, we want to talk a little bit about the impact of these cuts on the farm economy. Uh, so next up we have Cara. Thank you, Ranking Member Craig, for having us out here today. My name is Carara Ronin. I am a fifth generation farmer from Laurel, Montana, where we run a diversified operation. My husband and I moved back home about three years ago from the big city life to support my 91-year-old grandmother so that she could stay on our farm operation. Supplemental nutrition assistance programs are important part of Montannon's lives, not only for our veterans, for our single mothers, but for our elderly and for our children. Moreover, they are an integral part of the fabric that weaves together our farm communities, providing valuable opportunities for producers like myself to provide fresh local produce, eggs, and meat directly to our communities. Partnering with a single school or ger in our communities can allow for an economic boon to our farm with that one single contract for the season. It can push us over the line of being negative to being net positive. I know there are certain TV shows that everyone likes to watch that may make you think that life in Montana is something that it's not. But I can assure you all the farmers and ranchers I know are not millionaires. They're not billionaires. Some of us are even barely getting by. An increase in revenue for our operations ensure not only that our community members are being fed the most nutrient-rich food, but that our generational family farms can stay just that generational and in operation for years to come. contracts that we have through fe food procurement um programs statewide in Montana. Things such as the double SNAP dollars, which at the beginning of this week were frozen and luckily unfrozen, go directly into farmers pockets. They ensure that people utilizing SNAP benefits are procuring their foods directly from the farmers. Working together with SNAP programming, we can focus on the very specific needs of our communities. We can work together with fellow farms and operations to make sure that our community is covered. As many of you know, with the egg crisis that just has come about in our local community, my egg availability did not change. The price of my eggs did not change. It was the same as when we started at the beginning of this year. I was able to provide those foods to my community. Whether it was through the local food system at the school or through our local community markets, multiple farms in one area can combine to meet and combat the needs that are specific to that community. Our farmers and ranchers, their prices don't need to waver. they have that steady contract and that steady input cost that we're guaranteed for that upcoming season. For me, I'm buying seed already this year for the 2026 market season. When we have contracts taken out from underneath of us that we have with food banks and with schools utilizing these nutritional programs, that also puts our farm at risk for closing its doors. It can also leave our farm with extra produce and product that has nowhere to go. There is nothing worse as a farmer than having rotting food in the fields and people that need to eat. Farm and nutrition go hand in hand. Let's plan to keep it that way. Let's keep local food on the tables and our farmers in their fields. Thank you, Cara. Thank you so much. That was uh just extraordinary. Uh, and we're gonna have Cat take us home here and then we'll answer a few questions. Cat, hello. Um, I'm going to give you a little context about myself. Oh, sorry. I'm not going to hit you. Um, expressive hands. Um, and why SNAP matters and has mattered to my specific farm and then also our farm community. So, my name is Cat Becker. I farm in Athens, Wisconsin. We're in the north central part of the state. We still have a frost coming tonight just to give you a context of where we live. Um, we pro produce on a 50acre farmstead. My three kids and my husband live there with me and we have five employees. Our farm produces for our region and state. And we also do a little bit of maple syrup, but it's almost all vegetables. SNAP has been part of my 20-y year farm career, both before I had my current farm, Cattail Organics, and now on my current farm. When I started my farm in 2017, SNAP was even more essential as a beginning farmer because we knew that those dollars could be taken locally and we could serve our community. Um, now SNAP is still significant. And I'm going to talk to you about the way that SNAP funding actually comes to farmers and then also talk about the context in our rural commodity producing county. Our county is now number two. I don't get to say number one for dairy production in the United States. So my community and my neighbors are commodity producers. Their lives might be different than mine in terms of their market access, but we're in the same community. So policies that impact them impact me or community members. SNAP dollars come to my farm in three, well, two ways with one hopeful way. Um, and I'm going to explain that. The first one is that it comes through farmers market. So farmers markets in our county receive um the funding directly from SNAP users. So SNAP users come and they swipe their cards and they get tokens and they can shop at the farmers market. They also can receive double your bucks which is a program that doubles the amount that they are able to spend with every SNAP dollar um using local and state money. Those programs are important for people's dinner plates, but they're even more important because for every one bunch of carrots they might buy from me, they can buy two. The impact on our farm is huge. The impact on wages for our employees is huge. And the impact on what we're able to spend in our communities is huge. The second way that we take funding is through a nonprofit that processes funds together with donations to allow people to access again more food using that federal money. So SNAP money has an exponential effect often at the state and local level because other programs piggy back on those programs. So it's not just SNAP dollars that get eliminated when SNAP gets eliminated. It's also the ability of local areas to use that money to incentivize that people come shop locally and get healthier food. The third way that I am hoping to serve my community with SNAP is through online SNAP. Some of you might know that SNAP dollars can be used for purchasing groceries online from big box stores like Walmart and Amazon. That is an important thing because there are disabled people, people who work um shifts in the middle of the night, people that can't make it to grocery stores, people that are elderly, people that can't get to a grocery store, especially in rural communities like our own. However, USDA has only been piloting online SNAP for farms for the last two years, and we applied this year. We are approved as a SNAP vendor through the first process, but they've frozen the process. And so, this is a this is a second thing to just mention that online SNAP is very important for rural communities because not everyone can drive to a farmers market once a week. Um, and people's access to food is greatly enabled by online snack. I would be doing door-to-door delivery for people in rural communities. The last thing that I want to mention is that SNAP dollars impact our community in other extremely important ways. We have a local grocery store in Athens at named the Main Street Market. It used to be an IGA. It was bought by new owners last year. Rural areas use SNAP. Rural areas use more SNAP than a lot of urban and perry urban areas. In our community, the bottom line for the small grocery store to be able to pay its bills, pay its employees, and also donate money to our volunteer firefighters like I do, it's dependent on that source of revenue. And so, SNAP has an impact on our community that way. As well as the most basic thing that I believe as a farmer, which is that all people in my community, all children, all elderly folks, all people working or not, retired or not, deserve food as a basic right. and that is important to us. So, SNAP impacts the farm economy. It impacts our farm communities and SNAP is a rural issue. Thank you very much. Awesome.