With Trump’s proposal to gut federal food assistance by $192 billion — much of which would come out of the shopping carts of the working class — the president is once again proving his willingness to shaft those who supported him most.
Contrary to the racially-tinged stereotype that Americans who rely upon the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance (SNAP) program — formerly known as food stamps — are primarily “inner city,” liberal people of color, the reality is that many SNAP recipients are white, rural and suburban Americans who voted for Trump; the president won eight of the ten states with the highest percentage of SNAP recipients.
Not surprisingly, the parts of the nation with the highest rates of SNAP usage tend to be those with the highest levels of poverty, hunger, and food insecurity. In 2015, 42 million Americans lived in households classified by the federal government as “food insecure,” meaning they could not always afford the food they needed. Of those, more lived in rural areas and suburbs areas than in cities.
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