Cities Prepare for the Worst as Trump’s Food Stamp Cuts Near - 25.1.2020

CLEVELAND — Next month, Cuyahoga County, Ohio’s second largest, will begin sending letters and fliers, making phone calls and hosting information fairs to alert struggling citizens of a change about to befall them: Come April, able-bodied adults without children may lose their food stamps if they do not find work fast.

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A Trump administration rule change, long in the making, is about to become real, and by the administration’s own estimates, nearly 700,000 people across the country — 20,000 of them in Ohio, 3,000 alone in Cleveland and Cuyahoga County — will be dropped from the food-stamp rolls.

“That’s a fairly big hit for the county, for our population,” said Kevin Gowan, the administrator of Cuyahoga Job and Family Services, which oversees the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly (and still popularly) known as food stamps. “We’re not happy to do it. It is our job and we will fulfill our job.” 

To the Trump administration, record low unemployment and steady economic growth mean there is no time like the present to nudge people off federal assistance. Around 40 million people access the food-stamp program each year, nearly 3 million of them able-bodied, without children. Of those 3 million, around 2 million do not work.

“Millions and millions of people don’t need food stamps anymore,” President Trump declared this week at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. “They have jobs. They’re doing really well.” … (continued)