Hunger does not happen in a vacuum. It is built, policy by policy, narrative by narrative, into a country that has turned the simple act of feeding your family into something to be ashamed of.<\/p>\n
For decades, opponents of SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) have shaped\u00a0public discourse around who “deserves” help and who is “gaming the system.” That framing costs people access to life-saving food. Fear of judgment leads eligible people to delay or abandon their applications entirely. Deliberate confusion about who qualifies (be it immigrants, college students or working adults) keeps people in the dark about benefits they have every right to access.\u00a0<\/p>\n
According to the Food Resource and Action Center, since Congress passed the so-called \u201cOne Big Beautiful Bill\u201d in July 2025, over 5 million individuals have lost access to SNAP<\/a>. In Allegheny County alone, enrollment fell by 19,000, with many of those likely tied to new work requirements<\/a> and additional paperwork hurdles buried in the bill. These are veterans, older adults, people with disabilities, your neighbors, your coworkers, your relatives, all losing their most effective defense against hunger.\u00a0<\/p>\n Defenders of these cuts call the program bloated, say it breeds dependency, insist it needs to be reined in. Ignoring the data, they strategically flatten SNAP recipients into a single category, rather than recognizing a large, diverse group of people navigating poverty in an economy where food prices surged 23.5%<\/a> between 2020 and 2023, where a full-time job no longer guarantees food security, and where 74% of SNAP households in Pennsylvania<\/a> include at least one working adult.\u00a0<\/p>\n This rhetoric also upholds a history of systemic racial inequality, which it continues to feed to this day. In Pennsylvania in 2024, Black residents experienced food insecurity at nearly three times the rate of white residents<\/a>, 27% compared to 10%, and Hispanic and Latino residents face rates nearly as stark. Research from Johns Hopkins confirms that SNAP meaningfully narrows the gap in food insecurity<\/a> between participating Black and white households. To cut SNAP is to exacerbate these disparities, and this is not accidental. The communities hit hardest are the same ones that have been the target of racist policy and rhetoric for generations.\u00a0<\/p>\n Meanwhile, bureaucratic dysfunction provides convenient camouflage for what is a political choice. Nearly half of SNAP participants in Pennsylvania<\/a> report not receiving paperwork with enough time to meet deadlines; three in 10 struggle to reach a caseworker by phone; and many\u00a0face wait times of an hour or more just to speak with someone. Thousands of accounts are closed every month because the system is chronically understaffed and overwhelmed.\u00a0<\/p>\n The fixes are not complicated.\u00a0<\/p>\n Fund county assistance offices so that staff are not drowning.\u00a0 These are not radical demands. They are the baseline for a functioning program.<\/p>\n What stands between those fixes and reality is not a lack of solutions. It is a lack of political will, built on policy designed to judge whether people have earned the right to eat.\u00a0<\/p>\n We can and should debate budget math and administrative bottlenecks, but we must be honest about what’s driving this moment. Hunger isn’t an accident of policy failure. For too many in power, it’s the intended result. Until we say that plainly, and demand better with real urgency, the cuts will keep coming and the food bank lines will keep growing.\u00a0<\/p>\n Kellie Wild is executive director of the Pittsburgh Food Policy Council and can be reached at kellliew@pittsburghfoodpolicy.org<\/a>. The Pittsburgh Food Policy Council is a nonprofit organization that mobilizes people through listening, educating and advocating for policies and programs that shift power, expand access to resources and strengthen the Greater Pittsburgh food system.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\nStreamline documentation and extend certification periods so that a missed piece of mail does not mean going hungry.\u00a0
\nInvest in multilingual outreach.\u00a0
\nTreat applicants like people.\u00a0<\/p>\n