The U.S. Department of Agriculture is threatening to withhold money for food stamps from 20 states, including Connecticut and New York, for refusing to share personal information about recipients.
Democrats lead all 20 states. They’ve refused to hand over information like social security numbers, birthdates and addresses to the federal government.
Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said the department will stop funding SNAP in the states that don’t comply starting next week. They asked for the information back in May. 28 Republican-led states have already complied.
Rollins said the information is needed to root out fraud in the program.
“As of next week, we have begun and will begin to stop moving federal funds into those states, until they comply and they tell us and allow us to partner with them to root out this fraud and to protect the American taxpayer,” Rollins said during a cabinet meeting at the White House on Tuesday.
The Democratic-led states sued to block the requirement months ago and were granted a preliminary injunction. It’s not clear how Rollins' declaration will impact that lawsuit.
Democrats have said they’re worried the information would be used for other purposes, such as immigration enforcement.
“They are so out of touch that they think starving our neighbors is good for their politics,” U.S. Representative Rosa DeLauro (D-CT-3) said. “They are so preoccupied with partisanship that they cannot see the basic humanity of the people they are hurting. Hunger is not confined to a political party. The president’s own voters will suffer from this, too.”
Connecticut typically receives $72 million a month from the federal government for SNAP. New York gets $640 million.
This comes just weeks after widespread interruptions to SNAP caused by the government shutdown.
