The government is forecast to spend twice as much on SNAP this fiscal year — $114 billion — as it did before the pandemic, and the lead Republican on the House Appropriations Committee said Democrats wrote a blank check for food-stamp spending in the new fiscal year. Majority-party Democrats, meanwhile, said they wanted to make sure SNAP recipients receive their benefits. “For the first time ever, the bill provides additional protections for SNAP recipients by providing a ‘such sums’ appropriation for the fourth quarter of FY 2022 to ensure SNAP does not, and will not, run out of money,” said Georgia Rep. Sanford Bishop, the subcommittee chairman.
The dispute could resurface when the Appropriations Committee considers the bill, indicated Rep. Kay Granger of Texas, the senior Republican on the panel. The $198 billion funding bill for USDA, FDA and related agencies was approved on a voice vote by a subcommittee on Friday.
Congress is spending too much money, said Granger, during the 30-minute subcommittee session. The SNAP provision, she said, “essentially grants the administration unlimited spending authority for a nutrition program that was already dramatically expanded during the pandemic. At a time when our nation’s spending is at an all-time high, we should be finding ways to rein in spending rather than write a blank check.”
SNAP cost around $60 billion in fiscal 2019, before the pandemic. In a response to the economic recession that accompanied the pandemic, Congress temporarily increased benefits 15 percent and approved emergency assistance to the lowest-income SNAP recipients. In budget documents, the USDA estimated it will spend $114 billion on SNAP this fiscal year, which ends Sept. 30, and nearly $106 billion in fiscal 2022.
The USDA-FDA bill includes $907 million for rural broadband, an increase of $165 million from this year’s levels and $347 million for USDA programs to address climate change.
To watch a video of the markup, click here.
A summary of the bill is available here.
The test of the USDA-FDA funding bill is available here.