You can’t scream at the government because one person screaming is like spitting into the wind. It has no good effect. SNAP has gone by the wayside again. What *is* it with letting American people starve? Thank you, Judge Jackson (NOT.) Why? (You had to know this was going to happen.) From Politico and CNN:
The justice’s order came after the Trump administration raced to the Supreme Court ahead of a lower-court deadline to pay full SNAP benefits. Jackson’s move came after the 1st Circuit Court of Appeals declined to grant the administration an immediate reprieve from the district court judge’s order. In an order issued after 9 p.m. Friday, Jackson granted the Trump administration’s request for relief from a lower court order that would have required officials to tap into a separate nutrition account at USDA to deliver the usual SNAP payments for November.
Yup. Run to the Supreme Court. They have been noticeably partisan in their support of Trump. VERY noticeably. They have been skipping all the preliminaries and heading straight up to the top. It’s now surprising anyone bothers to go to court when they know Trump will just shove it upstairs. It’s a waste of their time. At least it *seems* they were going to abide by the lower court’s decision to pay it out. But we know better. And what’s to say it *has to* come from the nutrition program? Partial shutdown or not, why? And then this happened.
The US Department of Agriculture ordered states to stop issuing full food stamp benefits for November and to “immediately undo” any issuance of the full allotments, after a Supreme Court justice on Friday paused a lower court order requiring the agency to pay Americans their full assistance. In the Saturday directive, obtained by CNN, the USDA told states to instead proceed with issuing partial benefits that will provide recipients with 65% of their November allotments, as ordered by the same lower court judge earlier in the week. States that fail to comply could face a cancellation of federal cost-sharing of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, as well as be financially responsible for overissuances of benefits, the memo said. This latest directive leaves in limbo the roughly 1 in 8 Americans who depend on the nation’s larger anti-hunger program.
Wonderful. Not only do states have to stop, they have to UNDO. How are the people going to feel when they’ve gotten their benefits, only to have part of it disappear? This is some bullshit! This is the government screwing over the American people, yet they can go bomb boats outside of Venezuela with 2 to 6 people in them? Those aren’t cheap, either the planes or the bombs. ICE got a gazillion dollars to hire new people to terrorize cities. But we can’t feed OUR people.
The latest guidance from USDA follows a memorandum from the department on Friday saying it was working to fully fund food stamp benefits for November to comply with a federal lower court order, and that the process should be completed later that day. Several states quickly pounced on the news, saying the money should start flowing to recipients in the coming days. “Once we decided to step up and say we are going to make sure that our people are going to be OK … we’ve now received guidance saying the states are going to be punished for fronting the money,” Maryland Democratic Gov. Wes Moore said on CBS’s “Face the Nation.” The food stamp program has been in legal limbo since last month, when officials said recipients would not receive their payments for November due to the lapse in appropriations for the government.
So there you have it. The administration ran to the Supreme Court, as usual. States have to undo benefits already paid, or they get NO help for November. The administration doesn’t have to pay full benefits because of the government shutdown *cough*bullshit*again*cough*. People are going to starve in *our* country! What’s wrong with this picture??!! What. Is. Wrong. With. This. Picture….
Friends, I know everyone begs you for money. I promise, among all those asking for spare change, we are the smallest and the hardest working. We’re a group of old, disabled people, except for one writer in his mid-50s. The rest of us are in our sixties and seventies, and this is a labor of love. All we’re asking for is the chance to keep telling the truth about Trump and help ensure democracy survives. If you can help, please do. Thank you. Ursula
