Republican plans to cut $300 billion in food assistance are ringing alarm bells in Fresno.

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program provides food for more than 700,000 Central Valley residents.

“These proposed cuts to SNAP are not just numbers on a spreadsheet — they are meals taken off the tables of working families, seniors, and children in places like Fresno County,” Fresno County Supervisor Luis Chavez said. “In a region where food insecurity is already too high, gutting critical assistance is unconscionable.”

The House Agriculture Committee advanced legislation on Wednesday that proposes $300 billion in SNAP program cuts.

On Thursday, Rep. Jim Costa, D-Fresno, called for Republican House members to meet with Democrats and produce a bill that will protect food-insecure families and individuals.

“House Republicans just pushed a budget blueprint that guts SNAP and weakens America’s safety net that millions of Americans rely on. Food is a national security issue, and we must treat it as such. These cuts are real, and they hurt families in the San Joaquin Valley and across the country,” Costa said.

The federal government has funded SNAP benefits since its inception during the Great Depression.

This break of SNAP’s foundation as a federal entitlement program poses significant concerns for the Central California Food Bank and local leaders.

“SNAP is the most effective and efficient anti-hunger program operated by the federal government and provides nine meals for every one meal provided by food banks,” Central Valley Food Bank co-CEO Natalie Caples said. “The cuts proposed in this bill will exacerbate hunger in Central Valley communities and put neighbors experiencing food insecurity and our food bank in an impossible position.”

Republicans Defend the Bill

Republican lawmakers assert that the proposed cuts will get rid of wasteful spending and return SNAP to its intended purpose.

“For far too long, the SNAP program has drifted from a bridge to support American households in need to a permanent destination riddled with bureaucratic inefficiencies, misplaced incentives, and limited accountability,” Agriculture Committee Chairman Glenn Thompson, R-Pennsylvania, said in a statement.

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Potential Rise in Food Insecurity

The proposed cuts would exacerbate hunger in the Central Valley, putting food banks in a tough situation, Caples said.

The Central Valley Food Bank currently serves over 320,000 people every month. The food bank does not have the resources to provide for the influx of people requiring food because of the cuts, according to Caples.

Additionally, the cuts will take SNAP money out of communities, causing local economies to face a downturn, program advocates said.

Every $1 in SNAP benefits spent locally generates more than $1.50 in economic activity. This money generates jobs, from transportation and packing companies to grocers stocking shelves.

These fundamental changes to SNAP are bad for food banks, farmers, local grocers, and ultimately for the communities, Caples said.

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