Dan Kildee: “This week, unfortunately, food stamps will be cut by $5 billion. We expected that. What is worse is that even deeper…”

“This week, unfortunately, food stamps will be cut by $5 billion. We expected that. What is worse is that even deeper cuts could follow. Conferees start negotiating a farm bill this week, and billions of dollars in cuts--in fact, $40 billion--have been proposed by Republicans in the House, which is 10 times the number of cuts passed in the bipartisan bill in the Senate. Since I have been here in Congress, I have talked to dozens of people in my district who have come up to me and said, Thank you for fighting to preserve the food stamp program. I have never told anybody, they say, but I received food stamps at one point in my life, so thank you for fighting. I am afraid that many Members of Congress simply don't know what it is like to be poor in America. These are real people--real human beings. The cuts that we contemplate here are not numbers on a piece of paper but are cuts that would literally take food out of the mouths of people who are hungry. This is wrong. It cannot stand. I urge my colleagues to fight to preserve this important program. ____________________”