As SNAP funding lapsed, a top official called the program 'corrupt' [View all]

As the controversy over funding the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) during the government shutdown dragged on in recent days, the top official in charge of the program pivoted to a new talking point, calling the program that some 42 million Americans rely on "corrupt."

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins described SNAP at a recent press conference as "so bloated, so broken, so dysfunctional, so corrupt that it is astonishing when you dig in." The message came as headlines highlighted food banks warning of an impending crisis as money ran out over the weekend for SNAP recipients.

"We have found thousands and thousands of illegal use of the EBT card," Rollins said, referring to the electronic benefit transfer cards used by SNAP recipients. "We have been moving people off of SNAP. We've got almost 700,000 people, I think we've moved off just since the president took office. We've arrested about 118 people."

She added, "We found one guy in six different states getting a benefit. We found about 5,000 people that are dead who are still getting benefits."

People with experience analyzing SNAP and other safety net programs say such statistics need more detail and context about how they were calculated to be evaluated.

"We have real questions about how they've arrived at these numbers," said Nicole Schneidman, an attorney with the nonprofit, Protect Democracy. Schneidman represents SNAP recipients and hunger and privacy groups who sued over USDA's data demand to states.

https://www.npr.org/2025/11/04/nx-s1-5595920/snap-usda-rollins-fraud


Deja Vu.

Reagan pulled the exact same shit.

This time they want to kill us off for good.