With the clock ticking down on getting Food Assistance funding to close to 900,000 Arizonans, including almost 400,000 children, and 30,000 veterans, Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes and her 24 perennial partners in securing justice for the American People, have filed another lawsuit to push the Marie “Let Them Starve” Trump regime to fund the SNAP program so citizens do not go hungry starting on the month of Thanksgiving.
Please click here to review the complaint filed by Mayes and the other 23 parties.
Holding a press conference following the filing of the suit, Attorney General Mayes explained her and the other leaders reasoning behind filing the complaint asking for relief and countered Trump lies and misinformation that their hands are tied in distributing the contingency funds to SNAP beneficiaries.
Please click here to watch the press conference.
In her remarks, the Attorney General started off by recounting an Arizona Mom expressing her despair on how she would make ends meet for her family if her food assistance was cut off.
Saying “In addition to causing health insurance premiums to Skyrocket as open enrollment begins for the ACA, the GOP controlled Congress and the Trump Administration are now risking the health and safety of close to a million Arizonans who rely on SNAP benefits each and every day, and every month,” Mayes condemned the latest act of cruelty aimed at America’s most unfortunate, commenting further that “They are quite literally ripping away access to food and health care for millions of Americans. Just as we enter the holiday season In Arizona.”
Attorney General Mayes also cited some statistics to highlight the burdens this cut in SNAP would do to the Arizona economy.
These include that the cuts would:
- Affect 12 percent of Arizona’s population.
- Take away an average of $360 a month from eligible recipients toward paying for groceries that most can not make up for on their own.
Furthermore:
- For every meal a food bank/pantry provides, SNAP supplies nine.
- Trump and his Project 2025 allies have, since their return, cruelly canceled $500 million in food deliveries, totaling 94 million pounds.
- 4600 retailers will take an economic hit when customers are not able to use their EBT cards.
- One in four of the SNAP recipients are children.
- In the press release announcing the lawsuit, the Attorney General’s office cited the “USDA has estimated that in a slowing economy, every $1 in SNAP benefits generates $1.54 in economic activity.”
After reciting these statistics, the Attorney General said “This cruelty is totally and completely unnecessary. The USDA… does appear to have at least five billion dollars and perhaps more in SNAP… reserve funds that covers appropriated for emergency situations, just like this one. In fact, for several years, including under the first Trump Administration. The USDA repeatedly repeatedly acknowledged that SNAP continuity funds were available for paying benefits. And USDA may have access to other sources of funds that can be lawfully shifted. They should use that funding to provide November SNAP benefits immediately. The people who rely on snaps are low-income families, seniors, and young kids.”
Blasting Trump and his Gilded Age Billionaires First cronies for their senseless cruelty, Mayes remarked:
“The Trump Administration is intentionally hurting folks who need help the most as they are using actual lives as a bargaining chip in a fight over whether healthcare premiums should skyrocket. That is why we are suing. The Trump Administration can and should continue to provide SNAP benefits. I will not stand by as Arizona families go hungry. Arizonans should not ever ever be used as a bargaining chip while Donald Trump plays politics. Yanking away low income grocery support while Trump’s tariffs make household goods even more expensive is just cruel. It’s especially cruel to do this in November, the month of Thanksgiving.”
Concluding her opening comments, Mayes reminded the press attendees that she and her close to two dozen Attorney General partners across the country have already secured favorable decisions against the Trump Autocracy, offering:
“I feel confident that the law is on our side as we try yet again to protect the American people from the war as being waged against them by the Trump Administration.”
In the very first question after her initial remarks asking if she felt the USDA had a point that they could not release the funds for SNAP, Mayes, in a professional way, said the Trump surrogates were, surprise surprise, full of it, relaying:
“The agency is now lying. And the Trump Administration is flat, out lying. The agency itself, put out multiple memos, saying that this contingency funding was meant for and could be used in this kind of a situation where a shutdown is occurring, and we needed to continue to provide SNAP benefits to families and children…These contingency funds have been used in the past for just this type of situation in the middle of a shutdown. To make sure that our family don’t go hungry…This Administration changed its tune, I think, within the scope of a month, So it’s head spinning. The ways are line, Um, that is why I think a federal court will find in our favor.”
Attorney General Mayes actions come a day after Arizona Governor Katie Hobbs sent a letter to Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins urging her and Trump to release the SNAP Contingency funding, writing:
“…Arizona Families, already struggling with rising costs at the grocery store are being forced to the brink because of Washington D.C.’s political dysfunction. Older adults and families with growing children are at risk of going hungry. Over 31,000 veterans in Arizona will see their benefits cut. And food banks across the state, already feeling the strain, are struggling with how they will be able to meet a drastic spike in demand…”
“…Countless families…their budgets squeezed by rising costs…And they watch our nation’s capitol from afar, upset that they’re the ones when our politicians can’t work across the aisle to solve the challenges we face…”
“…Arizona’s Families should not be used as leverage in Washington D.C.’s political games…”
In her press release announcing the letter to the Agriculture Secretary, Hobbs’s was a little more blunt and accusatory toward MAGA Republicans and Trump, writing:
“Vulnerable Arizonans cannot afford to be used as leverage by Washington Republicans. It’s appalling that this administration is choosing to take food out of the hands of Arizona families. They could take action today to end this crisis and deliver food assistance to nearly one million Arizonans who rely on SNAP to feed their family. Instead, they’re choosing to let seniors, children, veterans and families on the brink of crisis go hungry because of their political games. President Trump must reverse this decision to withhold $6 billion of food assistance.”
“Growing up, my family at times relied on food stamps to get by. We weren’t looking for a hand out, we were looking for help during tough economic times. Countless families are going through those tough times right now; they work hard to make ends meet but sometimes they can’t quite make it happen because of rising costs and an economy that’s been damaged by reckless Washington politicians. Choosing to withhold this critical assistance is a slap in the face to Arizona families who are already on the receiving end of cuts to SNAP and Medicaid, and suffering from the devastating effects of this administration’s chaotic trade war.“
Hobbs’s press release noted that Mr. Trump, the one who, unlike his two immediate Democratic predecessors, believes there are two Americas, the one that supports him and the one that he could care less about, told reporters in mid October that he would look to cut what he labeled “Democratic Programs.”
SNAP is one of those programs but who it hurts may be lost on many Republican local, state, and federal leaders.
As Democratic consultant Rachel Bitecofer said in a post from earlier today:
“The day the SNAP benefits don’t come is going to be a moment of reckoning for lots of Red staters.”
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