Healey: Mass. can't afford federal food aid cost shift
Healey wrote to leaders of the U.S. House Agriculture Committee contending that potential changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program would shift 'significant costs to states that they did not plan for and cannot afford.'
Depending upon the share of spending offloaded to states, Healey wrote that the proposal could cost Massachusetts between $185 million and $710 million per year, calling even the lower estimate 'an exorbitant burden.'
'These proposed changes would create an impossible situation for our most vulnerable families and residents. SNAP supports more than one million Massachusetts residents, one third of whom are elderly, one quarter of them are children, and a quarter of those who receive SNAP in our state have a disability,' Healey wrote. 'They receive a modest benefit, which averages about $10.70 per day per household. Beyond the direct benefits to families, SNAP is essential to the state's economy. Every dollar in SNAP benefits generates up to $1.50 in local economic activity, supporting thousands of Massachusetts jobs across many different industries, including farmers, grocers, manufacturers, delivery drivers, and other positions throughout the food supply chain.'
The U.S. House Agriculture Committee on Wednesday advanced a bill that could cut up to $300 billion in federal spending on SNAP.
Republicans in Congress are working to craft a massive domestic policy bill that would slash government spending in many areas in part to pay for extension of tax cuts President Donald Trump signed in his first term, which are set to expire at the end of the year.
MassHealth estimated that another portion of the package that moved through the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee could result in Massachusetts losing more than $1 billion annually.
The potential loss of significant federal revenues may soon force Beacon Hill Democrats to reassess spending priorities and choose whether to come up with revenue to salvage programs, perhaps through new taxes or the use of rainy day reserves.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Boston Globe
25 minutes ago
- Boston Globe
Our national park trip, where Trump's heavy hand loomed
Republican Senator Jim Banks of Indiana thinks our parks need to 'tell the story of what makes America great.' That's fine. But what Banks and the president seem not to realize, and what my son and I endeavored to explain to my third-grade grandson, is that the only way America can be great is for all of us to face the bad along with the good, and to work hard every day not to erase the bad but rather to learn from it. Our challenge, we said, is to not repeat the bad and instead to keep trying to do better to make our country beautiful, honest, welcoming, and fair. Advertisement Michael Felsen Jamaica Plain
CNBC
26 minutes ago
- CNBC
Investing in Space: NASA's months of reckoning
For half a year now, NASA's been weathering a storm on every front, from its budget to its chain of command and potential program terminations. Employee uproar was an inevitable chapter of the saga. A group of 360 current and former NASA employees have penned a letter rebuking "rapid and wasteful changes" across staffing, mission and budgetary cuts at the space agency. "The last six months have seen rapid and wasteful changes which have undermined our mission and caused catastrophic impacts on NASA's workforce," the letter says, noting concerns that the proposed downsizing in personnel and funding are "arbitrary and have been enacted in defiance of congressional appropriations law" and that "the consequences for the agency and the country alike are dire." Signatories of the letter, titled the Voyager Declaration, urge the U.S. leadership not to implement "harmful" cuts and dispute "non-strategic staffing reductions," curtailing research projects, as well as cancelling contracts and participation in international missions or assignments for which Congress has already appropriated funding. It's no small list of objections raised at a time of broader uncertainty at NASA, which faces significant — and long chronicled — declines in funding and staff, amid a broader White House push to shrink down the federal workforce. "NASA will never compromise on safety. Any reductions—including our current voluntary reduction—will be designed to protect safety-critical roles," NASA Spokesperson Bethany Stevens said in an emailed statement. "The reality is that President Trump has proposed billions of dollars for NASA science, demonstrating an ongoing commitment to communicating our scientific achievements. To ensure NASA delivers for the American people, we are continually evaluating mission lifecycles, not on sustaining outdated or lower-priority missions." Adding to the tumult, NASA on Monday announced the high-level exit of Makenzie Lystrup, who will end her two-year stint as Goddard Space Flight Center director on Aug. 1. NASA says the step was communicated internally before any knowledge of the letter. It's not the first loss from the agency's senior ranks in recent months: Laurie Leshin stepped down from the director post of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in June. And more exits could be forthcoming: at the start of the month, Politico reported that at least 2,145 senior-level employees could depart NASA, many serving in core mission sets. Throughout, NASA — notable for both its own achievements and its substantial contracts to the U.S. private space industry — has remained without long-term leadership, after U.S. President Donald Trump's initial pick, tech billionaire and Elon Musk ally Jared Isaacman, was unexpectedly removed from consideration back in May. Sean Duffy, Trump's transportation secretary, was appointed to hold up the fort as NASA's interim administrator just this month. Inevitably, there's money on the line. NASA clinched a budget of $24.875 billion last year — 8.5% under its initial request and 2% below the funding of 2023 — that was matched in 2025. Under the Trump administration, the agency battled the possibility of a roughly 25% budget trim in 2026, although the U.S. House of Appropriations subcommittee has pushed back on these cuts. If enacted, the Trump funding proposal of $18.8 billion would have been the smallest NASA budget since before the U.S.' first crewed Moon landing via the Apollo 11 mission, commemorated this week on July 20. In a Monday statement, Trump said his administration is "building on the legacy of Apollo 11" and endorsed NASA's initiatives focused on "returning Americans to the Moon —this time to stay — and putting the first boots on Mars." Colonizing the red planet has been a vocally stated objective of the U.S. president since his January return to office, echoing the ambitions of his then-ally Musk. The two have since parted ways through an explosive rift, but the dream to land U.S. astronauts on the Moon and Mars has gripped the nation, with a respective 67% and 65% of those surveyed in a CBS News/YouGov pollv now in favor.
CNN
an hour ago
- CNN
Ex-Biden chief of staff told congressional staffers that Clinton, Sullivan raised concerns about Biden's waning support
Former President Joe Biden's chief of staff, Ron Klain, told staffers on the House Oversight Committee that former National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton raised concerns to him in 2023 and 2024 about Biden's political chances, two sources familiar with the matter said. One of the sources said Klain told staffers that Clinton and Sullivan approached him with the belief that Biden was 'not politically viable.' But another pushed back on that characterization. That source said Klain told the committee Clinton had told him, 'The campaign was not succeeding in dealing with the age issue.' Klain said Clinton made the comment in 2023, that source said. And he told the committee that after Biden's weak performance at CNN's Presidential Debate last June, which furthered questions about his mental acuity, Sullivan told him that Biden 'was losing support.' Klain served as White House chief of staff for Biden's first two years; Clinton was not in his administration. A Clinton spokesman did not dispute Klain's account, but said Clinton was concerned with how the question of Biden's age was being handled politically in light of the attacks and questions he was facing. 'Jake did not have a conversation with Ron about Joe Biden running for president before the debate,' a representative for Sullivan, Adrienne Watson, told CNN. Klain was appearing as part of the committee's investigation into Biden's mental fitness and decline. One source said Klain told staffers he believed that Biden had the mental sharpness to serve as president and that he did not think Donald Trump was too old to run, but acknowledged that Biden was less energetic and more forgetful. Klain said Biden often confused names and proper nouns, and he appeared tired and ill before the CNN debate, the source said. The GOP-led committee has sought interviews with former Biden White House aides and even his White House physician, who refused to answer questions earlier this month. While Biden faced questions about his age and mental fitness throughout his presidency, scrutiny mounted following the disastrous CNN debate which ultimately led him to drop out of the race, making way for then-Vice President Kamala Harris to assume the Democratic nomination. Hillary Clinton was among the high-profile Democrats who immediately threw their support behind Harris after Biden stepped aside. But in the months since the 2024 election, new reports have emerged on the extent of Biden's decline. According to the book 'Original Sin,' from CNN's Jake Tapper and Axios' Alex Thompson – Biden, in the final two years of his presidency, had private moments where he could not recall the names of top aides, had an increasingly limited private schedule, was prone to incoherence and losing his train of thought, and was hidden from the public eye to shield the extent of his decline. The book revealed several instances of Democratic lawmakers, White House aides, members of Biden's Cabinet and Democratic donors being shocked at Biden's diminishing mental and physical capabilities during his reelection bid. But nearly all did not speak out publicly or try to stop him from running. 'Biden, his family, and his team let their self-interest and fear of another Trump term justify an attempt to put an at times addled old man in the Oval Office for four more years,' the book reads. CNN's Kaanita Iyer contributed to this report.
