Posted on 06/27/2016 11:36:08 AM PDT by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
Maine Gov. Paul LePage may have considered a proposal to prohibit food stamp recipients from using their benefits to buy candy and sodas to be a sweet one, but the Obama administration disagrees.
The friction between the Republican governor and the U.S. Department of Agriculture has reignited a debate after the Obama administration denied LePage’s request to put restrictions on what can be purchased with food stamps.
In a letter to Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, LePage said: “It’s time for the federal government to wake up and smell the energy drinks.”
In an interview with The Daily Signal, LePage’s health and human services chief explained what’s at stake.
“Certainly as a safety net program where the second word of the program’s name is nutrition, it is imperative that we are supporting what constitutes nutritional food and restricting those items that are not nutritional,” Mary Mayhew, commissioner of the Maine Department of Health and Human Services, said.
“There should be no debate that candy and soda are not nutritional, and we should not be funding with taxpayer dollars the purchase of candy and soda with the SNAP program,” she said.
SNAP is short for the the Agriculture Department’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, better known as food stamps.
Last week, the Agriculture Department rejected LePage’s plan to prohibit Maine’s food stamp recipients from using them to buy candy and soft drinks.
The rejection letter prompted a fiery response from LePage, who criticized the Obama administration for being hypocritical regarding its commitment to healthy eating in schools.
In a response to Vilsack, the Republican governor wrote:
(Excerpt) Read more at dailysignal.com ...
A sort of Nanny State PING!
Go away with food stamps totally they make people lazy.
I’d go one further. Not only should the cards reject candy & soda purchases, but any attempted purchase of stuff like that should flag the cardholder for review for potential fraud.
LePage would make an excellent VP for Trump.
Folks waste their Food Stamp money, then need free breakfasts and lunches for their kids and food pantries for food. It's not fair to us taxpayers who are actually striving to balance our budgets on fixed incomes. And it isn't teaching those families collecting handouts to plan responsibly to feed themselves and their families.
Grrr....end of rant.
LePage has the right idea.
We control what is bought with food stamps already. This is just an expansion of the fact you can't used your food stamps at McDonalds.
In California, soda is ok on food stamps, but a cooked rotisserie chicken is not.
Food Stamps are currency for Dem votes.
I love my governor.
Don’t remember if it was on FR or FB, but a very smart person said food stamp currency should be replaced with food delivery - or pick up - of approved, nutritious foods only. I think that’s an awesome idea.
Food stamps should be limited to things like rice and beans.
When it’s our money they are ingesting, the food should be highly limited.
Nutritious, cheap and healthy is all that is needed.
Sounds like peanut butter, milk or juice, tea and whole wheat bread. Anything else is a luxury and on your own dime.
26 years ago, due to a layoff, we had to go on WIC for a couple months. We had a toddler.
The products eligible for purchase were even limited by brand. My wife once grabbed the wrong brand of something and it got kicked by the computer.
That’s how it ought to be. I agree with LePage.
Yup. If you know how to cook with scratch ingredients and choose wisely, that amount would be sufficient.
You’re right. WIC has limitations to specific and certain products, why can’t it be limited the same way with SNAP?
In MI they use food stamps for cases of soda, then they dump the soda in the parking lot and return the empty cans for the 10 cent deposit!
They can keep the 10 cents and use it for cigarettes and beer.
Yeah, all the gubmint cares about be dem ghetto votes. Like LBJ said after he decided to throw money at the ghetto: “......”
I’d go one further and also say that they should NEVER be able to get “cash back” when using the cards.
Oh isn’t that clever..
A cooked cold chicken is ok, we have to keep an entire section in our store of cooked cold food for EBT!! I have NEVER understood this YET Kentucky Chicken has EBT signs in Windows????
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