President Donald Trump’s former White House spokesperson defended GOP cuts made earlier this year to a federal food program for millions of Americans, despite some of his family members relying on it.
Harrison Field made his comments Monday on CNN during a discussion about Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits (SNAP), which are expected to not be distributed this weekend due to the long-running government shutdown.
The Department of Agriculture said that it can’t pay the roughly $8 billion needed to fund November’s SNAP benefits unless Congress, which is out of legislative session during the shutdown, approves it.
Democrats and Republicans are blaming one another for the shutdown, caused by a standstill over extending the Affordable Care Act tax credit which expires by the end of the year. If Congress does not extend the program’s tax credit, millions of Americans will see their health care premiums spike.
During Monday night’s episode of “News Night With Abby Phillip,” Fields asked, “Who cares about health care when you cannot put food on the table?”
He continued, “You have a lot of Americans that are going to be without food stamps because of the Democrats.”
Neera Tanden, head of the Center for American Progress, sarcastically told Fields, “It is amazing to get lectures on how much you care about SNAP benefits.”
“Because I have family members on SNAP!” Fields interrupted.
When Tanden pointed out that Fields supported Trump’s cuts to SNAP earlier in the year, Fields claimed his party was simply “cleaning up the program of waste, fraud and abuse.”
Democratic states filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration Tuesday, arguing that the federal government should use emergency funds to cover all or a large portion of November SNAP benefits.
The host, Phillip, questioned why the administration is “willing to move money around” for other reasons, “But why not [for] this?”