House Democrats’ attempt to use the COVID-19 pandemic to secure bigger, more expansive federal welfare programs is hardly surprising. Democrats’ most recent bill shows how an inflated welfare system has long been a goal of Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s caucus. Remember, back in March, House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn called Congress’s response to the shutdowns and growing crisis a “tremendous opportunity to restructure things to fit our vision.” But when millions of unemployed workers are waiting to get their jobs back and resume their independent lives, increased pressure to become even more reliant on the food stamp program is a dead end, trapping people in dependency.
Now more than ever, we need to reinvigorate the spirit of a true safety net (there for those who need it, when they need it), or else, it will hold families and our country back from soaring again.
Pelosi’s latest edition calls for even more spending and expansion for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. Already, Congress has allocated more than $85 billion to the food stamp program through appropriations and contingency funding. Congress has allowed every state to increase the number of enrollees receiving the maximum food stamp benefit without verifying any increased need in the enrollees’ households. Some families receive $1,000 a month, just in food stamp benefits, due to these emergency measures. For households that were already on the program, their monthly food stamp benefits have already increased by upwards of 77%.
Yet despite these emergency measures, Democrats are asking for an additional $10 billion, a 15% increase in food stamp benefits, a permanent increase to the minimum SNAP benefit per month, policies that erode program integrity, and more SNAP funding for states. As if the additional spending isn’t enough, they want to waive all work requirements, exclude pandemic unemployment compensation as countable income for SNAP benefit calculation, and prevent the Trump administration’s rules to promote work and improve food stamp program integrity from moving forward — rules that will be critically important reforms as the economy gets back to work and recovers.
The food stamp program has a long history of becoming a welfare trap for able-bodied adults. Statutory work requirements (which include preparing for and going to work, that are proven to help move able-bodied adults from welfare back to work) had been waived in several states, and, as a result, countless people miss out on experiencing the many positive benefits that come from work. Even worse, loopholes in the program were being exploited to allow even millionaires onto the food stamp program.
In an effort to break the cycle of government dependency and protect welfare for those who need it, the Trump administration proposed rules to reinstate work requirements for able-bodied adults without dependents and close broad-based categorical eligibility loopholes. Pelosi and the Democrats are attempting to remove reasonable rules and tools that will be helpful to lift people out of dependency during the recovery. Efforts to prevent these rules from moving forward are just another attempt to expand welfare, and they must be stopped.
Now is the time to incentivize work and unleash the spirit of workers, not trap them in dependency with more incentives not to return to work. States need to safely and swiftly reopen. Lawmakers must do all they can to promote a strong economy, bring businesses back, and promote work for all able-bodied people. Any effort to prop up the food stamp program as the comprehensive solution for workers should be seen exactly for what it is — exploiting a crisis. It’s time to double-down on the Trump administration’s rules, not shy away from them.
Robin Walker is the senior director of federal affairs at the Foundation for Government Accountability.
