The domino effect of cutting SNAP during a trade war
By Michael Jones
House Republicans will decide this week whether to make poor Americans more hungry by restricting access to food. As they prepare to mark up their portion of a GOP megabill to enact President Trump’s legislative agenda, proposed cuts to SNAP wouldn’t just hurt families by limiting their ability to use SNAP to purchase food—they’d ripple through the farm economy, triggering layoffs, shuttering small-town grocery stores, and destabilizing already vulnerable rural communities.
With Trump’s revived trade war squeezing farmers and driving up prices at the checkout line, Republicans are doubling down on a plan that could force Congress to clean up the damage later—just like we saw in 2018 and 2019. Once again, short-term cruelty could lead to long-term economic fallout, leaving working families and farmers to pay the price.
“This is like someone setting a house on fire and then saying we’ll pay to rebuild it,” Rep. Angie Craig of Minnesota, the top Democrat on the House Agriculture Committee, told me last week. “The Trump trade war is decimating the farm economy.”
Craig added that today’s circumstances are even more dire than during the last farm bailout.
“We’re already seeing signs of a serious situation across the country—where we could be headed toward something similar to the 1980s,” she said.
When farmers struggle, the whole economy feels it.
Agriculture doesn’t operate in a silo—it supports a vast network of grocery stores, trucking companies, manufacturers, food service workers, and rural communities. As farmers lose income, they cut spending, lay off workers, and buy fewer supplies, which weakens fragile local economies. Supply chains tighten, food prices rise, and pretty much all families nationwide pay more at the register.
During Trump’s first term, the administration issued emergency aid packages to offset losses from the trade war, particularly with China. These were funded through the Commodity Credit Corporation, a government entity that supports the agriculture sector. But today, the CCC’s ability to provide further assistance is limited, as its funds are nearly depleted. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins has acknowledged that contingency plans may be necessary if trade disputes worsen, though she claims the administration hopes to avoid another bailout.
Meanwhile, SNAP isn’t just a nutrition program—it’s a critical engine of the farm economy. If Republicans slash $230 billion from it as they’ve proposed, the impact could be a $30 billion loss in farm income. Every dollar in SNAP generates an estimated $1.50 to $1.80 in economic activity, much flowing through food supply chains and into the pockets of farmers, grocers, and truckers.
When families use SNAP to buy milk, bread, and produce, they create demand that supports jobs from field to shelf. That means farmers sell more, workers stay employed, and rural communities—where many SNAP dollars are spent—remain economically stable. SNAP strengthens food security and the agricultural backbone of the country by putting money directly into the hands of people who will spend it quickly and locally.
But if Republicans get their way, life for SNAP recipients could unravel fast. Instead of $6.20 a day, they might have to stretch $5 or less—barely enough for a couple of meals, let alone three. Parents could skip dinner so their kids can eat or turn to food pantries already stretched thin. Seniors on fixed incomes might choose between groceries and prescriptions. Veterans could find themselves standing in line at food banks.
And in rural and low-income areas—where many grocery stores rely on SNAP spending to stay afloat—shops could shutter, creating food deserts where even those who can afford groceries have nowhere nearby to buy them. This isn’t just a budget cut, Democrats warn. It’s a direct blow to millions of Americans’ survival, dignity, and stability.
Supporters of GOP-backed SNAP reforms argue the changes are necessary to curb federal spending and promote state responsibility and individual self-sufficiency. But the GOP megabill currently under consideration could add roughly $5 trillion to the federal deficit over the next decade—surpassing the $4.5 trillion cap set by their own budget resolution, according to the nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.
And the premise that SNAP is ripe for reform ignores some critical facts. The program already includes work requirements for non-disabled adults between the ages of 16 and 59: Recipients must register for work, accept suitable job offers, avoid voluntarily quitting, and participate in state-assigned employment and training programs.
Democrats have few procedural tools at their disposal, since budget reconciliation allows Republicans to pass their megabill with a simple majority in both chambers—bypassing the Senate’s 60-vote threshold for most legislation.
Still, House Democrats, including Craig and Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, are trying to mount a defense. Last week, they filed a discharge petition to force a vote on a bill that would exempt SNAP and Medicaid from reconciliation cuts, just as Social Security is already protected.
“Several so-called moderate or swing-seat Republicans have said they oppose these devastating cuts. Today, we gave them an opportunity to prove it,” Jeffries said last week. “The petition is live. We only need four Republicans to do the right thing—stand up for the American people and stop these devastating cuts.” (At press time, the petition has 205 signatures—all Democrats.)
Craig told me the ideal path forward is for Congress to pass a new five-year farm bill—legislation that traditionally garners bipartisan support and renews funding for agriculture, nutrition, and rural development programs. The most recent farm bill expired in 2023 and has been extended twice amid partisan gridlock, largely over SNAP.
Instead of negotiating a consensus bill, Republicans are attempting to fold major farm bill provisions into the reconciliation package—an approach Democrats say undermines decades of bipartisan agricultural policymaking.
“The idea that they’re going to gut the nutrition title [of the farm bill] in the reconciliation process and then ask folks to come back and support helping the very people that they’ve hurt?” Craig said. “I think that my colleagues across the aisle are already taking another look and saying, ‘I’m not so sure this is such a great idea.’”
Michael Jones is an independent Capitol Hill correspondent and contributor for COURIER. He is the author of Once Upon a Hill, a newsletter about Congressional politics.
