“A child hunger crisis is unfolding in plain sight.”
That was the warning this week from experts from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities over the fallout from President Trump’s devastating cuts to food assistance.
Here’s what’s happening: The “One Big Beautiful Bill Act,” passed last year, made the largest-ever cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) – a vital lifeline that helps people provide food for their families.
Already, millions of people have lost food assistance as a result.
Congress has an opportunity to prevent millions of additional families from going hungry. But they must act urgently.
As part of the “Farm Bill,” we’re urging lawmakers to delay a provision in the OBBBA that would shift a substantial amount of the cost of SNAP to the states starting in 2027.
The details are complicated, but the bottom line is simple: the vast majority of states cannot afford this significant and unexpected cost – and the result will be more families going hungry. Nearly all states would be forced to make significant cuts, and many could eliminate SNAP entirely.
In response to this looming moral crisis, FCNL and our new cohort of Advocacy Corps organizers are mobilizing to demand Congress act.
Last week, as part of FCNL’s annual Washington Summer Intensive, Advocacy Corps organizers lobbied their members of Congress to protect SNAP. These young leaders will continue this work over the next year, empowering people in their local communities to lobby Congress for economic justice.
This week, we saw an important step in the right direction: The Senate Agriculture Committee rejected a version of the Farm Bill that would fail to adequately address the harms of the cost shift to states.
But this struggle is far from over.
In the wealthiest nation in the world, allowing any child to go hungry is an unacceptable moral failure. This is not a partisan issue, but a moral one.
Join us and urge your lawmakers: Protect food for families!
Elsewhere
Nuclear anniversaries
August 6 marked 81 years since the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima, and August 9 will commemorate the bombing of Nagasaki. The devastation of these atomic bombings was immense: 140,000 people died horrifically in Hiroshima and 70,000 at Nagasaki, with tens of thousands suffering afterwards from the impact of radiation.
Still, “the horror of nuclear weapons,” as UN Secretary-General António Guterres said, “is just one lesson of Hiroshima. Another is the need to build a world in which the threat or use of these weapons becomes unthinkable.”
This is an integral part of the peace and justice in the world we seek – to move towards repair and to end the threat of nuclear weapons.
Quaker Advocate Arrested for Speaking at Public Meeting for Voting Rights
Lon Burnam, a former FCNL Friend in Washington and a member of FCNL’s General Committee, was arrested this past week after speaking out against a plan to cut voting sites in Tarrant County, Texas. The Tarrant County Commissioners Court accused him of disrupting the meeting.
Lon served in the Texas State House of Representatives for 18 years and has a long history of advocacy and activism for voters and democratic engagement. We are proud of his work to make sure that everyone’s voice is heard in our elections and hold him in the Light in this struggle.
From the FCNL Network
- FCNL’s Maria Mitri and Lydia El-Sayegh wrote an op-ed breaking down how the violence of the post-9/11 wars has found its way back to the U.S. in our immigration enforcement system. As they point out, a commitment to justice could work the other way as well: “the same commitment to dignity, accountability, and the rule of law must guide US actions abroad and the treatment of communities at home.”
- To commemorate the 75th anniversary of the UN Refugee Convention, Patricia McBee, a member of FCNL’s community, wrote about her experience serving refugees resettled in her county. This has been an incredible blessing: “We have learned to love and work side-by-side with colleagues of different backgrounds…. Our hearts have been stretched.”
