President Trump’s re-election campaign on Monday celebrated what it says was a one-month decline of 600,000 people using food stamps.
The campaign attributed the data to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which administers the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also known as SNAP.
“Today the USDA announced a one-month reduction in food stamp enrollment of nearly 600,000 people, further adding to the overall reduction in food stamp enrollment of 2 million people in President Trump’s first year in office,” the campaign said in a Monday morning statement.
“While food stamp enrollment dramatically increased throughout the Obama administration, the news from the USDA today demonstrates that President Trump’s economic policies are bringing hard working Americans back into the workforce and able-bodied adults off government assistance,” the campaign said.
USDA spokespeople did not respond to a request for additional information on the data cited by the Trump campaign. No USDA press release was posted on the agency’s website as of noon Monday, and the agency did not announce the drop on Twitter.
According to annual statistics kept by USDA, SNAP had an average participation of 42.2 million people in 2017. Participation peaked in 2013 with nearly 48 million people, a sharp uptick from the 33.5 million in 2009, Obama’s first year in office.
Republican lawmakers are considering expanding work-requirement rules for SNAP eligibility in this year’s farm bill.
Lara Trump, the president’s daughter-in-law and a campaign adviser, said in a statement: “As the president will discuss in his tax cuts roundtable for small businesses in Hialeah, Florida today, this good news from the USDA about food stamps is further proof that President Trump’s policies of deregulation and tax cuts is reaching American households in record numbers.”
