Professor exposes 'biggest losers' of SNAP cutoff — and it’s bad news for Trump

An Oklahoma State University professor says that the reality of who will be impacted the most by President Donald Trump's cutting off of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is not good news for the president.

Writing in The Root, Lawrence Ware, the co-director of the Africana Studies program at Oklahoma State University, says that the benefits expected to expire on Saturday aren't most used by those whom Trump and his base think.

Ware says the "MAGA faithful condemning 'lazy, shiftless' Black folks who need to 'get a job' instead of mooching off of hard-working (white) taxpayers" is "a tune that’ll never stop playing." It's also wrong.

"When we consider which demographic will suffer the most from the SNAP cutoff, there’s an inconvenient truth that the red hat wearers probably aren’t ready to hear," he writes.

While approximately 42 million Americans are expected to suffer from this cutoff, Ware notes that "it’s not just Democrats that will be impacted by this. Nor is it just Black folks. Americans of every race and political persuasion will be affected."

Ware also dispels the stereotype popularized by Ronald Reagan during his 1976 presidential campaign to criticize social programs, exaggerating the story of a real-life Chicago woman, Linda Taylor, to suggest that welfare fraud was rampant and widespread among recipients, particularly women of color.

"But despite Reagan going on about welfare queens and attempting to make it look like Black folks were the only ones who used these benefits, the reality of who this will impact the most may surprise you," he says.

White Americans are the largest racial group participating in the SNAP program, Ware explains.

"In fact, over 35 percent of the people on the program are white. What’s more, Texas, Louisiana and Florida, all red states, have some of the highest numbers of people living there who rely on the SNAP program," he says.

He also says the government shutdown is entirely on Trump and the Republican party and it is incumbent upon them to make a deal.

"And unlike last month where President Trump was able to find money to pay the military, the administration warned lawmakers in a memo Friday it could not and would not seek access to a range of emergency funds to extend SNAP. That is cold. Even for them," he writes.

"Just in time for the holidays, the most vulnerable among us will lose their ability to feed their families," he adds. "This is not a political issue. It is a question of human decency."