{"id":48067,"date":"2026-05-05T12:18:59","date_gmt":"2026-05-05T19:18:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/?p=48067"},"modified":"2026-05-05T12:19:00","modified_gmt":"2026-05-05T19:19:00","slug":"4-3-million-off-snap-and-counting-trump-official-celebrates-mass-loss-of-food-aid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/2026\/05\/05\/4-3-million-off-snap-and-counting-trump-official-celebrates-mass-loss-of-food-aid\/","title":{"rendered":"\u20184.3 Million Off SNAP and Counting!\u2019 Trump Official Celebrates Mass Loss of Food Aid"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"'4.3<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

US Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins testifies during a Senate Appropriations Subcommittee hearing on April 22, 2026 in Washington, DC.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u00a0(Photo by Heather Diehl\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cKicking 4.3 million Americans off of SNAP is not a flex, it\u2019s a failure,\u201d said Democratic Rep. Shontel Brown.<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Brad Reed<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

May 04, 2026 (CommonDreams.org)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

US Secretary of Agriculture<\/a> Brooke Rollins on Saturday openly celebrated millions of people losing their food assistance, which experts say is a direct result of the Republicans<\/a>\u2019 2025 budget<\/a> law that slashed<\/a> funding to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program by $186 billion over a decade.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a social media<\/a> post pointing to preliminary data from her department, Rollins boasted<\/a> that there were now \u201c4.3 million off SNAP<\/a> and counting!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

RECOMMENDED…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Federal<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Trump-GOP Law Spurs Largest Loss of Food Aid in Decades<\/a><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"2.5<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

2.5 Million Poor Americans Have Lost Food Aid Since Trump Signed GOP\u2019s Big Ugly Bill Into Law<\/a><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

\u201cUnder President Trump, Americans are getting back to work!\u201d Rollins added. \u201cHealthy employment numbers mean less reliance on government programs. Leaving benefits for those who truly need them. America is back in business!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In reality, the unemployment<\/a> rate is currently higher than when President Donald Trump<\/a> took office in February 2025 and there has been almost no growth<\/a> in net employment since the president announced his \u201cLiberation Day\u201d tariffs<\/a> just over a year ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Associated Press on Monday published<\/a> a fact check of Rollins\u2019 claims about SNAP, finding that Republicans\u2019 cuts to the program were far more likely responsible for the historic drops in enrollment than any purported improvement in the economy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Caitlin Caspi, an associate professor at the University of Connecticut who studies food insecurity, told the AP that current job creation numbers are nowhere near strong enough to explain the massive number of Americans losing access to SNAP.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019re not seeing a linear kind of drop-off,\u201d Caspi said. \u201cWe are not seeing, if you look at the unemployment rates, things that might be an indicator that a strong economy was driving this change. We don\u2019t see, for example, a pattern of decline in unemployment that would match the pattern of decline in SNAP participation.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Caspi\u2019s analysis was echoed by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP), which last week published<\/a> an analysis finding that \u201ceconomic conditions haven\u2019t been improving as the number of people receiving SNAP has plummeted in recent months, representing the sharpest decline in decades.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Instead, CBPP pointed the finger squarely at the GOP\u2019s budget law as the biggest culprit behind the decline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe deep cuts to federal funding for SNAP are shifting significant new costs to states,\u201d wrote CBPP, noting that the GOP<\/a> law \u201calso dramatically expands SNAP\u2019s already harsh and ineffective provision taking away people\u2019s benefits for not meeting the work requirement.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rollins\u2019 claims about SNAP enrollment were also criticized by Rep. Shontel Brown (D-Ohio), who expressed disgust that the administration is bragging about kicking people off food assistance during a time when the price of groceries has continued to rise thanks in part to Trump\u2019s own policies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBetter economy where?\u201d Brown\u00a0wrote<\/a>\u00a0on social media in response to Rollins. \u201cYou mean the one where Americans paid $300 more on their groceries to compensate for Trump\u2019s tariffs? Kicking 4.3 million Americans off of SNAP is not a flex, it\u2019s a failure. That\u2019s why I\u2019ve authored legislation to reverse the Trump SNAP cuts.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our work is licensed under Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0). Feel free to republish and share widely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Brad Reed<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Brad Reed is a staff writer for Common Dreams.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Full Bio ><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

US Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins testifies during a Senate Appropriations Subcommittee hearing on April 22, 2026 in Washington, DC. \u00a0(Photo by Heather Diehl\/Getty Images) \u201cKicking 4.3 million Americans off of SNAP is not a flex, it\u2019s a failure,\u201d said Democratic Rep. Shontel Brown. Brad Reed May 04, 2026 (CommonDreams.org) US… Continue reading → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48067"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48067"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48067\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":48068,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48067\/revisions\/48068"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48067"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48067"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48067"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}