Political Quotes

“Mr. Speaker, I rise to oppose this compromise bill, although I congratulate the people for working very hard on it. But the change in the heat and eat option is not just a little technical change; it is a change that has a freezing, chilling impact on every single SNAP recipient in Wisconsin. It not only increases bureaucracy, it decreases SNAP benefits to Wisconsin families whose benefits were cut already in November. {time} 0945 I am deeply concerned about the concrete hurt, hunger, and, quite frankly, the frigid cold that we impose today on thousands of low- income American households, including seniors, children, and the disabled. As many as 255,000 SNAP cases in Wisconsin will be affected by this change. How do I explain this to the women, children, seniors, and disabled in households how this ``technical change'' is minor when they stand to lose $90 a month in benefits? When you consider what they lost in November, $90 a month to a poor family is not a ``technical change.'' It is a lot of money. It is more than $1,000 a year. The price of food is not going to go down, nor is the price of fuel, nor is the purchasing power of the poor going to go up. SNAP benefits already do not meet nutritional needs throughout the month, and this change will mean that real food will be off real tables and out of the stomachs of current recipients. The proposed cut on top of ARRA resulted in a 9 percent drop in benefits allocation to Wisconsin. It is just too much.…”