Farm Bill Passed By House Agriculture Committee Would Cut Food Assistance By $30 Billion

CLASP is deeply concerned about this cut resulting from the bill’s failure to maintain the necessary updates to the Thrifty Food Plan (TFP), the underlying formula for determining SNAP benefits. 

In 2021, the U.S. Department of Agriculture modernized the TFP for the first time in nearly 50 years to reflect current food prices and dietary needs, resulting in a 21 percent increase in SNAP benefits per person. This 2021 update, which provided an extra $36 per month to SNAP participants, was crucial in ensuring that SNAP participants could afford a nutritious diet. Restricting future evaluations of the TFP undermines this progress and represents one of the largest cuts to SNAP benefits since 1996. Ensuring that SNAP benefits are sufficient is essential for promoting economic justice and addressing food insecurity. 

The bill falls short in other crucial ways. It doesn’t include adequate protections to prevent benefit theft through EBT card skimming and lets the authority to reimburse participants for stolen benefits expire.