The USDA requires that states ensure that illegal immigrants are not using food stamps.
The department hopes states will comply with President Donald Trump’s executive orders starting in February, and calls for improved ways to ensure that people across the country do not illegally receive federal benefits, including the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).
The measure aims to crack down on fraud and act as guardians as illegal immigrants are already not permitted to use SNAP perks. Only citizens and some legal non-citizens can do so.
“We’ve already arrested in Minnesota, New York and Colorado, and we’re just getting started,” Agriculture Secretary Brook Rollins told Fox News Digital in an interview.
“We’re going to be very, very aggressive. I hope it also serves as a deterrent now.”
The USDA asks the state to cross-check Social Security numbers in the Master File of Death and to use a free, systematic alien verification (SAVE) system provided by the Department of Qualification, provided by the Department of Eligibility, which applies to the Department of Non-Citizen Security, which applies for benefits, among other steps to verify the status of immigration.
Rollins said it was “a president’s vision that ensures we are the most efficient and effective in taxpayer dollars.”
“So I think we can reduce billions of fraud and save taxpayers a lot of money,” she said.
John Walk, who represented and wrote under the secretary of food, nutrition and consumer services. In Thursday’s letter State the SNAP agency and explain existing laws.
“The law allows only US citizens and certain legally existing foreigners to receive SNAP benefits. The Personal Responsibility and Labor Opportunity Settlement Act of 1996 (Public Law 104-193) established that “foreigners within the borders are not dependent on public resources.” SNAP was never available to illegal aliens,” Walke wrote.
Pollution is coming as scrutiny over illegal immigrant eligibility for benefits, such as in the California Medicaid program, which allows people to register without considering their immigration status, despite being funded by state and federal taxpayer dollars.
California Republicans said that while the eligibility for illegal immigrants in the program is liable for its bankruptcy, Gavin Gov. Gavin Newsom is just the only factor in the larger cost of health care issues nationwide.
“The federal government is now more careful than ever about how states spend their money,” Rollins said. “I’m from Texas. I actually have a lot of confidence in the Texas system. Honestly, I think the red states are probably a little more intentional and cautious about this. Of course, it’s the blue state that wants to put everyone on the backs of taxpayers.
Outside of immigration, SNAP is also facing calls for reform in several states to stop allowing the purchase of “junk food.” Arkansas Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders recently asked the USDA to allow the state to ban candy and soda purchases with the benefit of snaps, adding rotisserie chicken to its list of available options.
“President Trump and his administration are the perfect place to start, focusing on solving the American chronic disease outbreak and reforms to the food stamp program are the best places to begin,” Sanders said in a news release on April 15th.
“Prohibiting soda and candies from food stamps removes some of the healthiest and most processed foods from the program, encouraging low-income Arkansan to eat better.”
