Food Aid for Millions at Risk as Senators Leave for Weekend

Wendy Schiller, Professor of Political Science at Brown University, discusses the government shutdown as senators fail to resolve a standoff over funding food aid, leaving millions of low-income Americans struggling to purchase groceries starting Saturday.

Nov. 1 will mark the first-ever lapse in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and make as many as 42 million food stamp recipients a casualty in the month-long clash over funding the government.

Republicans describe the solution as simple: Democrats must drop their blockade of a stopgap funding bill, which they’ve used as leverage to extend expiring Obamacare premium subsidies, and allow the government to reopen.

Democrats counter that the White House could use contingency money to keep SNAP funded, as has been done during previous shutdowns, and is illegally refusing to do so. Republican leaders, at the same time, have blocked legislation to pay for food stamp and infant formula programs during the shutdown, saying that picking and choosing priorities would be unfair to unpaid federal workers.

“We’re not going to allow them to pick winners and losers,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune said of Democrats.

At the same time, President Donald Trump has found ways to pay the military during the shutdown, which began Oct. 1.

Republicans are banking that the SNAP cuts will force an end to the shutdown, and it’s not clear how long Democrats can hold out. Food aid is among the party’s core priorities and affects a bloc of voters that tends to vote Democratic.

Thune said on CNBC Thursday morning that the worsening hardships would improve prospects for ending the standoff.

“People are realizing what’s at stake now. And I think, you know, as the pain intensifies, I think we’re trending at least in the right direction. So we’ll see what happens,” Thune said.

But Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer, like most others in his party, has remained resolute and refused to bend on the health care subsidies.

“Democrats will not stand by while Republicans manufacture a hunger crisis,” Schumer said Wednesday.

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