House Republicans not only want to kick millions of people off of nutrition assistance, they claim they're all about reducing the size of government. Yet if their $40 billion in food stamp cuts became law, it could actually
increase state government bureaucracies.
The Republican bill eliminates "expanded categorical eligibility," a shortcut in which states give Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits to people who have qualified for other kinds of government aid. This allows states—40 of them, in fact—to avoid doing separate paperwork for each and every type of assistance a family might need.
Under the Republican House bill, however, that shortcut would be restricted yielding $11 billion in savings over a decade as households are discouraged or deemed ineligible for the benefits. An estimated 2.1 million people will lose benefits next year alone, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. But while the federal government’s payouts will shrink, cash-strapped states will have to start conducting more determination tests.
“This limitation in categorical eligibility would increase state administrative costs in SNAP and significantly curtail state flexibility,” the nonpartisan National Conference of State Legislatures wrote in a May letter responding to a similar provision.
But no one seriously contests the fact that it would kick many families off of food stamps, so it would still be a Republican-style win. (That is, in debate over the bill, Republicans insisted it would not take food from children. But I'm not counting as serious things Republicans claim publicly to avoid looking like heartless monsters.) They'd get to say they cut money out of the federal budget, and the increased burden to the states would get relatively little attention. But once again we see clearly that this bill is about hurting poor and low-income people, not about fiscal responsibility.
Please join Daily Kos and Ultraviolet in denouncing House Republicans for passing deep cuts to food stamps, and tell Congress to oppose all cuts.