The House-passed reconciliation bill includes the largest-ever spending cut for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), more commonly known as food stamps. The legislation would remove 3.2 million adults from the program. More than 2 million children live in households that would see at least some of their benefits reduced. A new report from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities elaborates:
The House Republican plan would cut SNAP, the nation’s most important and effective anti-hunger program, by roughly 30 percent. As a share of the program, the cut would be about twice the size of the deep cuts to food assistance enacted in 1996.[2] And these extreme cuts are deeper than the $230 billion in cuts the budget resolution called for because the bill adds tens of billions of dollars in new spending for farm programs, paid for by taking more food assistance away from people with low incomes.
Some of the bill’s spending-reduction goals are achieved by shifting more program costs to states. States would be required to pay at least 5% of SNAP food benefits starting in fiscal year 2028, but could pay up to 25% based on payment rate errors. State leaders would be forced to make tough decisions between cutting food assistance or other programs – or making up the difference by raising taxes:
As just one example, we estimate 5 percent of food benefit costs in Pennsylvania will be about $212 million in 2028 — roughly 1.5 times what the state spent in its 2025 budget on its Attorney General’s office, which prosecutes organized crime and public corruption, conducts statewide criminal investigations, and manages drug enforcement programs. But if Pennsylvania owed 15 percent of food benefits, its required payment would triple to $636 million. That would be more than double what the state spent on community colleges.
The Tax Foundation estimates the SNAP provisions would cost Louisiana $326 million per year – or more than the state spends each year to support the University of Louisiana System.
Uncertainty swirls ahead of hurricane season
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is predicting an above-average hurricane season, but recent federal cuts are causing concern about the agency’s ability to monitor and prepare for storms. Thousands of NOAA employees – including hundreds of weather forecasters – have been fired in recent months, and as Amy Green of Inside Climate explains, the federal government is pulling back from advising state and local leaders:
No one from the National Hurricane Center, a division of the National Weather Service, attended this year’s National Hurricane Conference in New Orleans, said Craig Fugate, a former FEMA administrator under the Obama administration and former director of the Florida Division of Emergency Management. Normally the National Hurricane Center would brief state and local emergency managers at the conference on new forecasting methods, to help the managers improve communications with the public about, say, when evacuations are necessary. The training is important because there can be high turnover among emergency managers, he said.
The Atlantic hurricane season starts on Sunday.
Treat Farm Line workers with human decency
For the second time, a federal judge has ordered the Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections to improve working conditions on the “Farm Line” at the state penitentiary at Angola. U.S. District Judge Brian Jackson writes that prison officials must provide more shade, rest and protective materials, such as sunscreen, for the men forced to toil away in fields for little or no pay. The Lens’ Bernard Smith reports:
“Plaintiffs have shown that incarcerated persons working on the Farm Line at LSP are at substantial risk of suffering serious harm under defendants’ current heat index, monitoring, and heat-alert practices,” he wrote in his order’s conclusion. Jackson, a federal judge in the Middle District of Louisiana in Baton Rouge, ordered prison officials on Friday to monitor temperature and humidity levels every 30 minutes and issue a Heat Alert when temperatures reach or exceed 88 degrees Fahrenheit. … Jackson had issued a preliminary injunction with similar protections from the heat last summer, in July, but the order expired in October.
Last August, lawyers representing Angola prisoners said the state corrections department was not complying with Jackson’s previous order to improve working conditions.
Credit scores plummet after missed student loan payments
Millions of Americans saw their credit scores drop in the first three months of 2025 because of delinquent student loans. More than 2 million borrowers’ scores decreased by 100 points, while more than 1 million saw their scores fall by more than 150 points. The Washington Post’s Abha Bhattarai reports:
Tina Johnson was two days away from finalizing the purchase of a used Nissan Pathfinder when she got notice that her preapproved loan was no longer valid. Her credit score had fallen from 650 to 418 after she missed $440 worth of student loan payments that she didn’t realize were required again. Although the Department of Education said lenders would send borrowers a bill at least three weeks before it was due, Johnson said she was never notified that payments needed to resume.
Student loan payments were paused during the Covid-19 pandemic, but that reprieve expired in September. The rising number of delinquencies, especially among middle-aged Americans, could be a harbinger of broader economic turmoil:
And although younger Americans tend to hold the most student debt, borrowers ages 40 and older are most likely to be behind on their loans, suggesting that years of inflation are making it harder for middle-aged Americans to keep up with payments. “This is the beginning of something big, and we need to be paying attention,” said Dominik Mjartan, chief executive of American Pride Bank in Macon, Georgia. “There’s a very high cost to having a low credit score in America. Your cost of living goes up — your cellphone bill, your utilities, your insurance payments, everything. And that trickles down through the economy.”
Number of the Day
64% – Percentage of U.S. adults who say it is a good idea for the government to provide financial assistance for people to rebuild in places at high risk of extreme weather. (Source: Pew Research Center)