Free Republic

Down in the swamps of Washington, D.C., our Congress is said to be hard at work hammering out a budget for the coming fiscal year. With a crisis of massive deficits looming, supposedly they are going to come up with some major areas where government spending can be cut. One of the areas under consideration for significant cuts is the program formally known as the “Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program,” or SNAP, and informally known as “food stamps.” According to the latest data from the Department of Agriculture, as of February 2025 the SNAP program had some 42+ million “participation persons,”...

For years, Democratic state leaders believed their immigrant programs were free from federal interference. But Republicans in Washington are now threatening to penalize states that continue them.

There are at least six million job openings in the U.S., yet we have a record number of working age men not working. Maybe one reason is the Feds are still paying people welfare not to work. Brad Wilcox and Grant Bailey of the Institute for Family Studies report: The 2024 Current Population Survey indicates that 31% of men ages 25-40 who are not working full-time collected some form of cash or cash-equivalent benefit in the form of food stamps, Social Security for disability, Supplemental Security Income, or unemployment insurance in the prior year. Such benefits are particularly common among...

In his budget plan for fiscal year 2026, President Donald Trump has proposed cutting a total of $32.9 billion in funding to HUD. The plan includes a $26.7 billion cut to federal rental aid — approximately 40% of the total — and would essentially end Section 8 and other housing voucher programs, according to NPR.

The House’s big, beautiful budget bill is bigger than it is beautiful, so it’s worth noting the better parts of the draft. The House Agriculture Committee is moving on a modest welfare reform in food stamps that will resuscitate the program’s connection with work. Americans who manage to sift through the media distortions will approve. By one think-tank estimate, nearly 13 million able-bodied adults were on food stamps in 2022, and the benefit covers some 12% of the U.S. population. People are supposed to work as a condition of benefits, but millions don’t. Live in California? The Biden Administration in...

Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) slammed Republicans on Tuesday for proposing major cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which helps an average of over 42 million Americans purchase food each month. “Folks who paid taxes and played by the rules, expecting that their government will help them if they fall on hard times and you guys want to tell them to all go screw themselves?” he said at a House Agriculture Committee markup meeting...... Experts warn that the bill could lead to more children facing food insecurity just as research shows that work requirements don’t actually lead to a...

A draft of President Trump’s “Big, Beautiful Bill” includes a proposal to establish so-called “MAGA” savings accounts for children. The pilot program — described as the “money account for growth and advancement” or “MAGA account” in the GOP bill released on Monday — would give every baby with a Social Security number born in the next few years $1,000. That money will then accumulate interest and value through investments over time — and families and employees can contribute up to $5,000 in the children’ s accounts annually. The goal would be that once the kids become adults they will have...

House Republicans are proposing to bar most non-citizens from receiving taxpayer-funded benefits, including food stamps, in President Donald Trump’s “one big, beautiful bill.” GOP lawmakers are pursuing an extensive overhaul of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) to help offset the cost of the president’s tax priorities. The House Agriculture Committee will include a provision in their draft bill to restrict SNAP benefits to those who are citizens or lawful permanent residents following Republican Illinois Rep. Mary Miller’s request to the panel to prohibit certain non-citizens from receiving food stamps. “Taxpayer-funded benefits like SNAP are intended for Americans in need,...

The Trump administration announced Monday that it has launched an investigation into California’s Cash Assistance Program for Immigrants, a state program that provides monthly cash benefits to aged, blind, and disabled non-citizens who are ineligible for Social Security benefits due to their immigration status.The investigation began in Los Angeles, with Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations Los Angeles field office issuing a Title 8 subpoena to California’s Cash Assistance Program for Immigrants, the Department of Homeland Security said in a news release. According to the department, the subpoena requests all records from the Los Angeles County Department of Public...

Last year, the three federal grantmaking agencies that award funds to arts and culture groups received a total of $708.8 million to award in a nation of 340 million people—or just over $2 per resident. When Deborah Block, artistic director of Philadelphia’s nonprofit theater company Theatre Exile, received word last November that a $25,000 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts had been approved for the development and production of R. Eric Thomas’ play Glitter in the Glass, she immediately set to work on getting this dramatic piece up and running. Fifteen people—including a stage manager, an assistant stage...

(WHTM) — A Pennsylvania man pleaded guilty to defrauding the United States Government of over $1 million in SNAP and Medicare benefits. According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, James Sessoms, 60, of Philadelphia, pled guilty today to one count of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) fraud, seven counts of false statements in connection with health care benefits, and seven counts of Social Security fraud. The U.S. Attorney’s Office says that in October of 2024, Sessoms was charged by indictment with those offenses after he used stolen identities and Social Security numbers (SSNs) to file for SNAP and Medicaid benefits. The...

Welfare fraud under $25,000 in California could be decriminalized due to Senate Bill 560, which was introduced by State Sen. Lola Smallwood-Cuevas (D) in February. The bill would decriminalize welfare fraud under that amount in the state for administrative errors, Fox News reported on Monday. According the outlet’s Bill Melugin, “Smallwood-Cuevas represents a large chunk of Los Angeles County, including Mar Vista, West LA, Baldwin Hills, Ladera Heights, Century City, Playa Vista, and part of downtown LA.,” he wrote in a social media post on Monday:

U.S. Secretary of Labor Lori Chavez-DeRemer warned states of losing federal funding if they fail to comply with President Donald Trump’s directives on rewarding illegal immigrants with tax dollars, according to an April 25 statement issued by the Department of Labor.“Our nation’s unemployment benefits exist solely for workers who are eligible to receive them,” Chavez-DeRemer wrote in a letter addressed to state governors.“To qualify for unemployment, one must be able and available to work, actively seeking work, and be legally authorized to accept employment in the United States. Unemployment benefits are not a handout for those in our country illegally.”The...

(Washington, D.C., April 24, 2025) – Today, at the direction of U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke L. Rollins, Acting Deputy Under Secretary for Food, Nutrition, and Consumer Services John Walk issued guidance to all State agencies directing them to enhance identity and immigration verification practices when determining eligibility for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). This guidance is one of many steps toward fulfilling President Trump’s Executive Order 14218, which directs USDA and other federal agencies to “enhance eligibility verification systems, to the maximum extent possible, to ensure that taxpayer funded benefits exclude any ineligible alien.” “President Trump has made...

This week, District of Columbia Judge Ibn al-Murderu ordered the restoration of the USAID funds designated for Hamas that he says "Secretary of State Marco Rubio has illegally canceled. The desire for government efficiency does not override the commitments made by the prior Biden Administration." ACLU spokesperson Bertram Petty praised the ruling, calling it "both correct and humane. Israel has cut off the humanitarian aid to Gaza that Hamas had been pilfering to supplement the contractual payments USAID had been making to the organization. This has made it impossible for Hamas to meet its payroll obligations to its fighters. These...

Administrative Law Judges Margo Stone (left, LinkedIn) and Som Ramrup (right, Association of ALJs) Dozens of administrative law judges grant disability payments to almost everyone who appears before them, overriding Social Security staff who determined the people were not entitled to payments, a Daily Wire analysis found. One of the Social Security Administration’s “regional chief administrative law judges,” Jennifer M. Horne, who leads the San Francisco hearing office, ruled in every case she heard last year that the claimant should be granted disability payments, even though in each case, two previous examinations had found the claimant should be denied. Ronald...

If HHS Secretary and healthy food advocate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has his way, SNAP will stand for Soda Not Allowed Period. On Friday, Kennedy brought his “Make America Healthy Again” campaign to West Virginia, where Republican Gov. Patrick Morrisey announced that he will be seeking permission from the Department of Agriculture to put soda on the list of items that cannot be bought through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, often referred to by its former name of food stamps, according to The Washington Post.

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) proposed legislation on Tuesday, the Nutritious SNAP Act, aimed at reforming SNAP to ensure that those who use it are doing so for healthy food options. Paul’s office issued a release on Tuesday asserting that SNAP has been a contributing factor “in a new public health crisis — obesity and chronic disease — by subsidizing the purchase of junk food with taxpayer dollars.” “SNAP was designed to fight hunger and improve nutrition — not to subsidize soda and junk food,” Paul said. “It makes no sense that taxpayer dollars are being used to fund an epidemic...

@RepThomasMassie People should not be allowed to use food stamps (EBT) to purchase sugary drinks like Coke and Pepsi. Libertarian arguments about choice do not apply here. The money being used for EBT was extracted from taxpayers who have no choice in whether to give up their money.

The IRS is nearing a data-sharing agreement with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement that would allow immigration officials to use tax data to support the Trump administration's deportation agenda, two sources familiar with the matter told ABC News. After weeks of negotiations, administration officials are close to reaching an agreement that would enable ICE officials to submit names and addresses of suspected immigrants lacking legal status for the IRS to check against its confidential databases. Section 6103 of the federal tax code requires the IRS to keep individual taxpayer information confidential with certain limited exceptions, which includes law enforcement agencies...