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Call for $2.5 Trillion in Cuts Proves GOP Wants to 'Steal Our Benefits'
"Nearly 60% of mandatory spending is for Medicare and Social Security," noted one expert. "If they don't touch those, they'd have to cut Medicaid to the bone."
Dec 20, 2024
With a potential government shutdown just hours away, House Republican leaders displayed a slide during a closed-door GOP conference meeting on Friday showing a draft agreement proposing $2.5 trillion in net mandatory spending cuts in exchange for raising the U.S. debt ceiling by $1.5 trillion at some point next year.
The slide was seen as further confirmation that Republicans are seriously eyeing cuts to Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and federal nutrition assistance—programs that fall under the mandatory spending category.
Though by law Social Security cannot be cut in the reconciliation process that Republicans are planning to use to bypass the Senate filibuster and Democratic opposition in the upcoming Congress, other key programs including Medicare and Medicaid could be vulnerable to the GOP's massive proposed austerity spree.
"The ONLY WAY to cut $2.5 trillion in spending is by slashing Social Security, Medicare, and/or Medicaid," the progressive advocacy group Social Security Works (SSW) wrote on social media in response to the slide. "Republicans want to steal our benefits to pay for their billionaire tax cuts."
Bharat Ramamurti, former deputy director of the White House National Economic Council, wrote that the slide "is a Republican commitment to cut Medicare, Social Security, or veterans' benefits (all to make way for new tax cuts for the rich)."
"There's no way to make this math work otherwise," he added. "Their promise is to cut $2.5 trillion in mandatory spending. Nearly 60% of mandatory spending is for Medicare and Social Security. If they don't touch those, they'd have to cut Medicaid to the bone."
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) warned that the draft agreement means "Republicans are plotting to cut healthcare for seniors and veterans to grease the wheels for tax cuts for giant corporations and billionaires like Elon Musk."
For weeks, Republicans have been discussing potential cuts and sweeping changes to Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP)—including the addition of new work requirements—to help pay for a fresh round of tax cuts that would largely benefit the richest Americans and large corporations.
Republicans working with Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy—the billionaire co-chairs of the soon-to-be-created Department of Government Efficiency—have also signaled that Social Security and Medicare cuts are on the table even after President-elect Donald Trump campaigned on protecting the programs.
"Republicans have made their plan for the new year crystal clear: Ram through massive tax giveaways for the ultra-wealthy and corporations, and pay for them by shaking down programs and agencies that working families rely on," Groundwork Collaborative executive director Lindsay Owens wrote in a Rolling Stoneop-ed on Friday. "And they're putting unelected and unaccountable oligarchs—Musk and Ramaswamy—in charge of deciding how much pain Americans will have to tolerate so that the rich can get richer."
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The GOP's Sneaky and Destructive Plan to Privatize Anti-Hunger Program
Privatization is often touted as a solution to bureaucratic red tape or cutting “wasteful” government spending, but in practice, it can mean cutting the experienced public workforce who administer complicated government programs.
Nov 28, 2024
The country’s largest and most important government anti-hunger program faces a renewed threat as Congress returns from recess next week: privatization.
Congress needs to reauthorize the now-expired Farm Bill—the enormous legislative package that includes funding for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, also known as food stamps)—but a privatization scheme was attached to the bill.
Congress should not be using much-needed disaster relief as a back door to privatize the SNAP program’s workforce.
Earlier this Congress, Rep. Don Bacon (R-Neb.) introduced the “SNAP Staffing Flexibility Act,” which was also adopted as an amendment to the current version of the Farm Bill. The bill would allow state agencies to hire outside contractors to administer key requirements of the SNAP program under certain conditions, such as in the aftermath of natural disasters or during pandemics and public health emergencies. Rep. Bacon and supporters of this proposal now aim to tack this provision onto the emergency disaster relief package under consideration this year. Make no mistake: This is an attempt to use emergency disaster relief as cover to privatize the SNAP program and workforce, instead of giving the SNAP program enough money to operate effectively.
Privatization is often touted as a solution to bureaucratic red tape or cutting “wasteful” government spending, but in practice, it can mean cutting the experienced public workforce who administer complicated government programs. This can result in prolonged delays, more people wrongly denied benefits, and ultimately worse outcomes for people who need the benefits most.
SNAP Is Our Most Important Anti-Hunger Program, But It Is Facing Renewed Privatization Threats
SNAP serves tens of millions of low-paid working families and other households with low incomes (including disabled and older adults). Like unemployment insurance, SNAP is responsive to the business cycle—meaning SNAP is particularly important during economic downturns when poverty and food insecurity rise. Between fiscal years 1980 and 2008, anywhere from 7 to 11% of U.S. households received SNAP. Participation grew dramatically during the Great Recession, peaking at 18.8% in fiscal year 2013 (47.6 million people).
Participation spiked again during the Covid-19 pandemic amid increased poverty and food insecurity. In fiscal year 2022, although total participation was lower than during the Great Recession (12.4% of all U.S. households participated in the program), SNAP saw a record-high participation rate among eligible individuals, equivalent to 41.2 million people receiving benefits in an average month. Expanded SNAP eligibility—alongside other relief measures such as Child Tax Credit expansions, universal free school lunches, and federal stimulus payments—kept food insecurity at bay during the height of the pandemic in 2021. However, as those programs expired—and the shocks of pandemic reopening and the Russian invasion of Ukraine led to food prices growing at an unprecedented rate—food insecurity increased in 2022.
As part of the SNAP quality control process, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) examines each state’s application processing timeliness (APT). The rate is calculated by dividing the number of SNAP applications processed by the number of applications that were expected to be processed during that period, typically 30 days since the application was submitted. In fiscal year 2023, APT rates ranged from a low of 39% in Alaska to a high of 98% in Idaho, with a median rate of 85% across all 50 states and the District of Columbia. In 2023, only four states met the FNS benchmark rate of 95%. Failure to meet this benchmark is not a new phenomenon. Based on available data, no more than a third of all states have ever met the 95% timeliness standard in any given year.
Proponents of SNAP privatization often point to slow application processing rates as evidence that the existing program is inefficient and in need of “reform.” However, this argument ignores important context on these rates and its connection to declining federal funding for SNAP and shrinking public-sector employment.
Chronic Underfunding of SNAP Strains Workers and Delays Processing of Essential Benefits
SNAP is a federal-state partnership, so the federal government pays the full cost of nutrition benefits and splits the costs of administration with states, but federal spending on SNAP administration has declined over time. Meanwhile, SNAP administrators’ caseloads have grown dramatically. Many states point to administrative problems—including low staffing, hiring freezes, and high turnover—as one of the biggest barriers to improving slow processing times and backlogs.
To be clear, low APT rates are a cause for concern because they indicate that many eligible households in need of food assistance are not quickly receiving those benefits. But the solution to ensuring applicants receive their benefits quickly is simple: Policymakers must increase funding for SNAP and restore sufficient staffing levels so that case workers can process applications effectively and efficiently.
Starving SNAP of Funding Serves the Long-Term, Right-Wing Privatization Agenda
The push to privatize SNAP eligibility determinations is decades-old and has produced serious problems in states that have contracted out these services or automated certain functions of the process. When Texas outsourced its SNAP eligibility determinations to a for-profit company in 2006, thousands of people were unable to apply or were given incorrect information and many were wrongly denied benefits. Public-sector staff were then forced to fix mistakes, and eligible SNAP participants were subject to long delays to receive benefits.
Efforts to defraud the SNAP program, including misuse of benefits or selling them for cash, is very rare. However, attention to purported fraud has increased in recent years, and SNAP workers have been forced to take on additional anti-fraud measures, further delaying processing and potentially contributing to low APT rates.
The SNAP Program Needs Support, Not a License to Cut More Corners
Congress should not be using much-needed disaster relief as a back door to privatize the SNAP program’s workforce. There are other real and urgent problems with the SNAP program this year—for instance, families have had their SNAP benefits stolen by card “skimmers” when they swipe their cards at grocery store cash registers. In 2022, Congress passed a provision that would allow states to pay back the stolen benefits to victims of theft, but that has since expired.
Farm Bill reauthorization should focus on preserving nutrition assistance benefits without cuts and on reducing administrative burdens and red tape for SNAP recipients, applicants, and staff—all of which could help reduce backlogs and improve how quickly people can receive their benefits. And disaster relief spending should focus on providing aid to vulnerable communities trying to rebuild after storms—not opportunistically trying to cut corners and privatize vital services.
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Trump's Nomination of Project 2025 Architect Means Social Security, Medicare 'Are At Risk'
"Vought's nomination makes it crystal clear that Trump lied to the American people," said Rep. Rosa DeLauro. "Trump's agenda is the Project 2025 manifesto."
Nov 25, 2024
President-elect Donald Trump's choice of Russell Vought, a Project 2025 architect, to lead the White House budget office was seen as further evidence of the threat the incoming administration poses to Social Security, Medicare, and other critical government programs.
Vought, who currently heads the far-right think tank Center for Renewing America think tank, served as director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) during Trump's first term, and he's set to return to the post after playing a central role in crafting the Project 2025 agenda that the Republican president-elect attempted to disavow on the campaign trail.
In remarks to an undercover journalist earlier this year, Vought dismissed the notion that Trump opposed the aims of Project 2025, saying the Republican leader was "very supportive of what we do."
Vought is expected to aggressively pursue federal spending cuts in concert with other actors within and around the incoming Trump administration, including the "government efficiency" commission led by billionaires Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy.
"With the architect of Project 2025 nominated to lead Trump's Office of Management and Budget, there can be no distinction between the two."
During his tenure at OMB and as an outside adviser to Republican lawmakers, Vought advocated massive cuts to Medicaid and federal nutrition assistance, programs that the GOP is targeting as it looks to offset the costs of its proposed tax cuts.
Vought also spearheaded budget proposals from the Trump White House that recommended cuts to Social Security and Medicare, both of which the president-elect vowed to protect during his 2024 campaign.
"Vought oversaw every budget in the first Trump administration that cut Social Security and Medicare," said Tony Carrk, executive director of the watchdog group Accountable.US. "This much is clear: Social Security and Medicare are at risk in the second Trump presidency."
According to Accountable, Vought is one of at least six individuals associated with Project 2025 whom Trump has picked for a spot in the incoming administration.
"With the architect of Project 2025 nominated to lead Trump's Office of Management and Budget," said Carrk, "there can be no distinction between the two."
While Project 2025's sweeping policy document includes little discussion of Social Security, the far-right program's authors have endorsed changes such as raising the retirement age—which would result in across-the-board benefit cuts.
As for Medicare, Project 2025 proposes making privatized Medicare Advantage plans the default enrollment option for U.S. seniors, a change that would be massively profitable for insurance giants and potentially disastrous for patients.
Vought's nomination to lead OMB is expected to bolster Trump administration efforts to slash spending across the federal government. As Punchbowlreported Monday, Vought "is among those Trump allies looking to challenge Congress' authority over spending via impoundment," a strategy that Democratic lawmakers have condemned as unlawful.
Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), the top Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, told Punchbowl in a statement that Vought "is deeply confused about this and many other points about the Constitution and the Impoundment Control Act of 1974."
"While Trump distanced himself from Project 2025, Vought's nomination makes it crystal clear that Trump lied to the American people," said DeLauro. "Trump's agenda is the Project 2025 manifesto."
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