Food Is No Luxury

The White House advisors drawing up budget recommendations for President Clinton’s sixth year in office should do the right thing and restore food stamps for legal immigrants, especially families with children.

California suffered the heaviest loss when Congress passed the 1996 Welfare Reform Act and its restrictions on immigrant aid. Clinton signed it with a caveat: that he would find a way to fix this aid problem, which he said was particularly unfair. Now is the time. He should redress the wrong by proposing about $500 million a year in the new budget to restore the food stamp program for low-income families with children, the elderly and the disabled.

Congress and the Clinton administration already took a major step in repairing part of the damage by restoring Supplemental Security Income (SSI) and Medicaid to nearly half a million elderly and disabled legal immigrants. But more needs to be done.

In total, about 1.5 million people have felt the weight of the cuts. The welfare reform law booted 900,000 adult legal immigrants out of the food stamp program nationally. The reduction, now fully implemented, has had a devastating effect on their households, which also contain 600,000 children who were born in the United States and thus are U.S. citizens.

The cuts have created a national crisis in charitable food pantries and soup kitchens. Now, Catholic Charities USA and other community-based organizations report that their shelves are almost empty.

In California alone, close to 280,000 people were cut from the food stamp rolls a year ago. Of those affected by the cuts, 86% are members of families with children. The state’s commitment to providing food stamps to them covers only a fraction of the need, and in many cases the restoration is only partial. Restoration of food stamps to legal immigrants is compassionate and absolutely necessary.

The White House staff has identified budgetary areas that can provide the funds for the program. The government, in justice and fairness, should share America’s food bounty with those in need.