Quote:President Trump’s big plan to kick 3.1 million Americans working for poverty wages off of food stamps just hit a snag when a Democrat House Committee Chair revealed that it would also cancel free school lunches for half a million children.



Trump’s cruel plan to starve American workers would let states raise the requirements to get benefits from the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP) by eliminating the work incentives that gradually decrease benefits when someone earns more money.

House Education and Labor Committee Chairman Bobby Scott (D-VA) sent a letter to Trump’s Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue which explained that his staffers told him about the devastating impact on children of lower means.

Yet, Perdue materially omitted his staff’s findings from the proposed rule that Republicans want to famish 1% of the entire American population. Rep. Scott wrote:

Quote:In a phone briefing with House Committee on Education and Labor staff on July 22, 2019, your staff stated that the Department’s Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) estimates that the proposed rule will result in more than 500,000 children losing their automatic eligibility for free school meals.
However, when the rule was published in the Federal Register, the Regulatory Impact Analysis (RIA) did not include discussion of the rule’s impact on free school meal eligibility.

SNAP benefits give children automatic enrollment in the free school lunch program, and in deeply impoverished areas contribute to an alternative program that feeds entire schools, based on eligible enrollees. NBC News reported the exact contents of the call:

Quote:During the call, the USDA said that 93 percent of the children affected by the change — more than 465,000 total — would qualify for reduced-priced meals, according to Scott’s staff.
Under that program, schools can charge up to 30 cents for each breakfast and 40 cents for each lunch.

It also turns out that omitting the devastating impact on children from the USDA’s new plan to emaciate the working poor also violates an Executive Order that President Barack Obama put in place called “Improving Regulation and Regulatory Review.”

The heart of President Obama’s order to improve regulation review is its mandate that the public has easy access to give public comment via the internet.


In order to give the public meaningful notice of what a federal agency is planning, they have to disclose “an opportunity for public comment on all pertinent parts of the rulemaking docket, including relevant scientific and technical findings,” which Chairman Scott’s letter notes.


The Democrat also asked Perdue to disclose all of their staff analysis demonstrating the extreme harm that President Trump is trying to inflict at the USDA and to re-start the clock on their damaging regulatory action to allow meaningful public comment.

One of the top reasons we have SNAP is that it promotes public health and well-being, especially for children, while helping families climb out of poverty.


Millions of sicker Americans will probably create a drag on the private sector when they can’t work due to ill health, and school children miss class because they’re starving.



But Republicans see cruelty as a feature of their policy proposals, not a bug.

(07-30-2019, 03:22 PM)GMDino Wrote: https://washingtonpress.com/2019/07/29/trumps-plan-to-kick-500000-poor-children-off-the-free-school-lunch-program-was-just-uncovered/

(07-30-2019, 04:11 PM)Mike M (the other one) Wrote: You do realize they are closing a loophole that people like Robert Undersander (a Minnesota retiree) with assets more than $1 mil applied for a received food stamps. Currently it only tests for income and not overall assets, so those 500k kids will likely be right back on it and just have to re-apply. Shame on those Republicans taking from the Rich to keep it with the really needy.

https://www.dailysignal.com/2019/06/24/after-legally-receiving-food-stamps-this-millionaire-is-trying-to-change-the-system/

Minnesota is among 34 states that, along with Washington, D.C., use the “broad-based categorical eligibility” loophole to avert the need to check assets, according to the Foundation for Government Accountability, a Naples, Florida-based fiscal watchdog group.

(07-30-2019, 04:17 PM)GMDino Wrote: I "realize" we are throwing the baby out with the bathwater over an amount of money that could be saved by cutting the President's golf in half or by applying our same level of "fiscal" to any of the larger budget items.

I'm saddened that we even consider doing this to the people who really need it because there are a few who abuse it.

I don't know where we are as a country.

(07-30-2019, 04:27 PM)Mike M (the other one) Wrote: Should've known, someone that's ok with illegals in the US, they most likely also be ok with abusers of the system.

(07-30-2019, 04:27 PM)Mike M (the other one) Wrote: Way to go, just shut down the entire conversation with the underhanded jab at the POTUS when it's not about him. Don't you ever get tired of making everything about him? You know that's exactly what he wants from people like you. Don't pay attention to the issue, pay attention to him. So good job saying his name again and making him happy.

(07-30-2019, 04:37 PM)GMDino Wrote: I said that there are better ways to save money than to go after a system that helps the least among us even if some are taking advantage of it.

My thoughts on moving immigrants towards citizenship and working with the border rather than closing it (well, one of them) have nothing to do with this separate program.


"underhand jab"

It is his administration and therefore his policy.

(07-30-2019, 04:47 PM)Mike M (the other one) Wrote: Have you ever helped someone come here legally?
Do you understand the whole process?
How long it takes, how much money it takes?
What kind of path do you want to give illegals to earn citizenship?
I hear this stuff all the time, but yet, rarely a path.

(07-30-2019, 04:47 PM)Mike M (the other one) Wrote: Back to Topic,
I want the loop holes closed. They are depriving people that actually need the money from getting the money. That's morally wrong.

(07-30-2019, 04:53 PM)GMDino Wrote: There have been other, smarter people who proposed such plans that didn't include building a wall, shutting the legal points of entry and slowing down the application process.

May I ask you your plan?


Is it keeping them from getting the money or is it just more money going out?

(07-30-2019, 05:37 PM)Mike M (the other one) Wrote: Your first sentence, has nothing to do with building a path towards citizenship, in fact it is geared at keeping them out. Total opposite of what I asked you.

Still waiting on you to answer any of the questions I proposed to you.

(07-30-2019, 05:37 PM)Mike M (the other one) Wrote: To your last question. Yes and yes.
Those that don't need the money should not be taking from it, it could be preventing those that need help with SNAP or other programs. Not everything is unlimited.

Quote:Trump’s cruel plan to starve American workers would let states raise the requirements to get benefits from the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP) by eliminating the work incentives that gradually decrease benefits when someone earns more money.

(07-30-2019, 05:57 PM)GMDino Wrote: I answered that other people have good plans.  Do you have one?




"could be"  is not as definitive as your early proclamation: "They are depriving people that actually need the money from getting the money. "

I am all for rooting out fraud.  I am not all for hurting those in need to catch a couple people.  Nor am I for it in this program that helps people when we are not focused on much larger areas of spending.

(07-30-2019, 05:57 PM)GMDino Wrote: I am all for rooting out fraud.  I am not all for hurting those in need to catch a couple people.  Nor am I for it in this program that helps people when we are not focused on much larger areas of spending.

(07-30-2019, 03:52 PM)BmorePat87 Wrote: We need universal free school breakfast and lunch. Some districts can qualify for it now, but we need it to be expanded.

(08-01-2019, 02:59 AM)BmorePat87 Wrote: An unfortunate reality is many students who qualify for free or reduced lunch do not get the paperwork signed either from parents not knowing, parents being uninvolved, or embarrassment. You also have that tweener population that doesn't qualify but still struggles to afford food. 

In addition to expanding free lunch, more communities need hubs in the summer for lunch for any and all kids. A lot of kids only get one hot meal a day during the school year.