LEADER JEFFRIES: "REPUBLICANS ARE NOW THREATENING TO WEAPONIZE HUNGER AGAINST THE AMERICAN PEOPLE"
Today, House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries held a press conference with Ranking Members Rosa DeLauro and Angie Craig, where he emphasized that while Republicans are threatening to steal SNAP from everyday Americans, Democrats will continue to fight to protect the healthcare and nutritional assistance of the American people and to end the Trump-Republican shutdown.
LEADER JEFFRIES: This is day 28 of the Trump-Republican shutdown, and Democrats continue to make clear that we will sit down with our Republican colleagues anytime, anyplace, here at the Capitol or back at the White House, in order to reopen the government, enact a bipartisan spending agreement that actually meets the needs of the American people and address the healthcare crisis that Republicans have caused that is devastating people all across the country—in working-class America, rural America, urban America, small town America, the heartland of America and Black and brown communities throughout America, particularly at this point given the Republican refusal to extend the Affordable Care Act tax credits. That will cause premiums, co-pays and deductibles to increase on tens of millions of people by thousands of dollars per year.
At the same time, Republicans are now threatening to weaponize hunger against the American people and withhold funding for nutritional assistance for children and seniors and veterans and women. This is on top of the fact that in the One Big Ugly Bill that Republicans passed in July, in addition to a nearly $1 trillion cut to Medicaid, Republicans enacted the largest cut to SNAP in American history—$186 billion cut. They ripped food from the mouths of children, seniors, veterans, women and families in order to provide massive tax breaks to their billionaire donors. It's completely and totally unacceptable. And on top of that, now they are threatening to withhold funding that the Trump administration has in a contingency fund in ways that will deprive everyday, hardworking American taxpayers of the nutritional assistance they need to put food on the table.
Full press availability can be watched here.