WASHINGTON (May 17, 2023) The following statement is attributed to Eric Mitchell, Executive Director of the Alliance to End Hunger.
“The Alliance to End Hunger continues to be alarmed by the apparent willingness to keep expansion of work requirements for SNAP and other safety net programs on the table during ongoing debt ceiling negotiations. It is disappointing that people who need help to buy food are being used as pawns in a political game. Work requirements are punitive and ineffective. They perpetuate the myth that people on economic assistance programs choose not to work when the evidence clearly shows otherwise, and by taking vital support away from SNAP participants, they actually make it harder to secure and maintain employment. Staving off a national default is essential, but it would be unconscionable to achieve that goal by taking vital economic and health support away from people in dire straits. Such proposals do not belong in debt ceiling negotiations or any other piece of legislation.”
