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Washington, DC – Nevada Senator Harry Reid released the following statement today: “House Republicans’ vote to deny nutrition assistance to hungry, low-income Americans is shameful. The Senate will never pass such hateful, punitive legislation. “Under the leadership of Chairwoman Stabenow, the Senate forged a bipartisan compromise that saves $23 billion without taking food out of the mouths of hungry Americans. Whenever the House gets serious about passing real legislation, they should follow the lead set by Chairwoman Stabenow.”

The House is expected to consider a bill this week that would cut food stamps by an estimated $4 billion annually and allow states to put broad new work requirements in place for recipients. The legislation also would end government waivers that have allowed able-bodied adults who don’t have dependents to receive food stamps indefinitely. The vote comes after the House defeated a wide-ranging farm bill in June because many conservatives believed the cuts to the nearly $80 billion-a-year food stamp program weren’t high enough. That bill would have made around $2 billion a year in cuts. …

NEWARK— The owner of four dollar stores in Essex and Union counties pleaded guilty today to defrauding the food stamp program out of $5 million by letting customers use the federal subsidy to pay for electronic devices and other non-food items, prosecutors say.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) – Food stamp fraud is a “significant problem” in Rhode Island. That was the message U.S. Attorney Peter Neronha sent Thursday when he announced that nine people are facing criminal charges for allegedly defrauding the federally funded Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program out of more than $3 million. During a two-year undercover investigation, Neronha said eight Rhode Island residents and one New York man were found to be illegally allowing food stamp recipients to use their EBT cards to obtain cash in exchange for a large surcharge at five Providence convenience stores. ... Six people were charged by...

<p>The food-stamp program spending grew primarily because of new program rules, and going back to 2007 program rules would yield significant savings for taxpayers.</p> <p>Something unusual has been happening with the food-stamp program, now known as SNAP, for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. Between 2007 and 2012, spending on SNAP more than doubled, adjusting for inflation and population growth.</p>

In addition to illegally trafficking in food stamps for years, Mohammad’s store operated illegally after the secretary of state canceled its business license in 2009 because of Mohammad’s failure to pay the business’s taxes. Store manager Ahmad Damra and clerk Mahmoud Jamil Damrah allegedly helped Mohammad defraud the SNAP and WIC programs for a total of approximately $780,710. Court records allege that the store traded customers’ WIC checks for a cash, allowing customers circumvent program restrictions on using taxpayer funding to purchase products such as beer and cigarettes.

We know that the employment situation in the US is terrible with 70% of jobs created since January 2009 being low-paying, part-time jobs. And median household income keeps declining. 20130816_mainstreetmisery After reading James Hamilton’s horrifying paper on the size of off-balance sheet liabilities for America, I thought I would put together the following table to you could see the household share of government debt, entitlements and The Federal Reserve Balance Sheet. householdshare There are 115,310,000 households in America. Government spending in the U.S. as of Q2 2013 was a little over $5.8 trillion. That equates to $50,328.68 per household. The...

The percentage of Americans that are economically independent has dropped to a stunningly low level. In order to be economically independent, you have got to be able to take care of yourself without any assistance from anyone else. Unless you are independently wealthy, that means that you either have your own business or you have a full-time job. Unfortunately, as you will see below, the percentage of Americans that are self-employed is at an all-time record low and the percentage of Americans with a full-time job has declined to a level not seen in about 30 years. As a result,...

Let me put it this way, my jaw hit the floor. Earlier this week I was able to screen a portion of this Friday’s Fox News documentary “The Great Food Stamp Binge,” hosted by Bret Baier. It airs Friday at 10 p.m. and Sunday at 9 p.m. ET on the Fox News Channel. This investigation focuses on a federal program called SNAP, or "Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program."

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor promised his Democratic colleagues that they would put the food-stamp portion of the traditional “farm bill,” which they split from its usual “agricultural policy” copilot earlier this month, on the agenda in short order. Republicans, however, have been cooking up a new plan for the food-stamp program just about certain to send all Congressional Democrats into an almighty uproar, via Reuters: U.S. House Republicans plan to propose a $40 billion cut to the nation’s food stamp program, the head of the House Agriculture Committee said on Thursday, twice the cuts previously sought by conservatives.Committee Chairman...

Welfare: SNAP, the U.S. food stamp program, has become a conduit for redistributing wealth and fundamentally transforming America, as welfare recipients now send food overseas and the White House markets to illegals. While the administration laments the distraction of "phony" scandals like Benghazi and Fast and Furious that leave real Americans dead, it trots out phony statistics about how well the economy is doing. "And what is absolutely true is that we have come a long way since the depths of the Great Recession," White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said at a recent press briefing. "We've created over 7.2...

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said yesterday that the Obama administration has pulled the nation from the depths of the “Great Recession” with the creation of 7.2 million private sector jobs. … Here’s what Mr. Carney didn’t say: Since February of 2009, the first full month of Obama’s presidency, 9.5 million Americans have dropped out of the labor force. Nearly 90 million Americans are not working today! That means that 1.3 Americans have dropped out of the labor force for every one job the administration claims to have created. …

The unimaginable happened for the second time this year on Thursday. Fiscal conservatives held their ground against expanding the size and scope of government. The Farm Bill failed passage in the House due to a coalition of conservative votes who thought there was too much spending, and ironically big-spending Democrats who felt there was too little. With Boehner’s announcement two weeks ago that he would be voting in favor of the bill, the likelihood of its passage seemed almost imminent. Even withstanding those odds, thousands of Americans rallied with phone calls, emails and outreach to keep the pressure on those...

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid says his chamber won’t pass an extension of farm policy this year and is pressuring the House to figure out how to pass a farm bill. The House rejected its version of a five-year, half-trillion-dollar farm bill last week, with 62 Republicans voting no after Speaker John Boehner urged support. The Senate passed its farm bill earlier this month with support from two-thirds of the chamber. Reid on Monday urged Boehner take up the Senate farm bill before current policy expires Sept. 30. … Both bills expand farm subsidies while saving money overall and making...

With new statistics showing a heavy reliance on food stamps in cities such as Holyoke and Springfield, Gov. Deval L. Patrick said he is concerned about a move in Congress to cut the assistance program for low-income families including tens of thousands of people in Massachusetts. "I'm worried about the future of the program," Patrick told The Republican. "I am worried about the fact that so many people need the program. And that has to do with the bottom falling out of the global economy and our climbing out of that, slowly but surely." Patrick, a two-term Democrat, said his...

(Reuters) - The American Medical Association joined the effort to discourage consumption of sugary drinks on Wednesday with a pledge to work to get them off U.S. government food aid programs for the poor. The nation's largest physician group said removing the sugary beverages from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program would help reduce weight-related health problems. "The AMA is working to improve the nation's health care outcomes, particularly cardiovascular disease and diabetes, which are often linked to obesity," said AMA President Dr. Ardis Dee Hoven said in a statement. The group's stance came a day after mayors in 18 cities,...

The mayors of New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and 15 other cities are reviving a push against letting food stamps be used to buy soda and other sugary drinks. In a letter sent to congressional leaders on Tuesday, the mayors say it’s “time to test and evaluate approaches limiting” the use of the subsidies for sugar-laden beverages, in the interest of fighting obesity and related diseases. “We need to find ways to strengthen the program and promote good nutrition while limiting the use of these resources for items with no nutritional value, like sugary drinks, that are actually harming the...

The White House is threatening to veto the House version of a massive, five-year farm bill, saying food stamp cuts included in the legislation could leave some Americans hungry. The House is preparing to consider the bill this week. The legislation would cut $2 billion annually, or around 3 percent, from food stamps and make it harder for some people to qualify for the program. Food stamps, now called the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, cost almost $80 billion last year, twice the amount it cost five years ago. The Senate passed its version of the farm bill last...

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), over two million Illinoisans—or 15.7 percent of the state’s population—are currently enrolled in food stamps. The USDA’s latest data shows 2,023,635 Illinoisans were enrolled in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) in February 2013. In February of 2012, 1,831,898 people took part in the program. That’s an increase of 10.5 percent in just one year. Illinois was the only state to see a double-digit increase of the number of residents enrolled in the SNAP program from the same time period last year. …

The Senate on Wednesday rejected a Republican bid to turn the federal food stamp program over to the states. The current program, known as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, is administered by the Agriculture Department and federal dollars are unlimited as long as recipients qualify. The program cost $78 billion last year, more than double the price in 2008. A proposal by Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., to a wide-ranging farm bill would have converted the program into grants to states, which could decide how to use the money, with certain restrictions. The Senate rejected the amendment 60-36. …