Corby Kummer: Trump's Proposed SNAP Cuts Are Rooted In The 'Welfare Queen' Trope

The Trump administration is proposing a change to the rules that govern who is eligible for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), commonly known as food stamps. Under the proposed rule changes, the U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates 3 million people would lose benefits, which includes an estimated 90,000 people in Massachusetts, according to the state's Department of Transitional Assistance (DTA).

The proposed changes would prohibit the states from expanding who is eligible for the program beyond the federal baseline, which is $33,475 for a family of four — or 130 percent of the federal poverty level. Right now, 39 states, including Massachusetts, offer federally-funded SNAP benefits to people who make more than that — up to 200 percent of the federal poverty level — but still qualify for benefits because they have other expenses that make it hard for them to pay for food.

In a statement, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue said the rule changes will “close a loophole” and will save the federal government an estimated $2.5 billion a year.

The administration and some Republicans in Congress have highlighted a case that involves a wealthy Minnesota man who had extremely low income, but huge assets, and said he applied for and collected SNAP benefits.

Corby Kummer, executive director of the food and society policy program at the Aspen Institute, told Boston Public Radio on Wednesday that the proposed change would also impact half a million children who currently get discounted school lunch. Kummer said that the administration's narrative harkens back to the derogatory trope of the welfare queen: that people rely on public services paid for by the rest of upstanding citizens, so they don't have to work themselves.

"The whole premise of this welfare queen free-loader, people are gouging the government and taxpayers because they want free school lunches, is so absurd. It's so hateful that it's hard to believe the cynicism, Kummer said. "This whole idea that people would be deliberately trying to freeload off of the government for food stamps, as opposed to, for example, the multimillionaire large big-ag farmers who get huge subsidies for growing things like soybean ... that gets unstated because that's Trump's base."

Corby Kummer is also a senior editor at The Atlantic and a senior lecturer at the Tufts Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy.