Candy crackdown

NICK EICHER, HOST: Coming up next on The World and Everything in It: subsidies for junk food.

Policymakers around the country are looking for ways to eliminate junk food from federal food benefit programs. And they want sugary items crossed off the grocery list for good.

But it’s a long road ahead to change the diets of many Americans—and it’s not necessarily going to happen with the SNAP of the fingers.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: Just a quick note: SNAP is a term you’ll be hearing throughout this story. It’s an acronym for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. SNAP is what we used to know as federal food-stamps administered day-to-day at the state level.

WORLD’s Addie Offeriens wrote this story. WORLD Radio’s Anna Johansen Brown narrates.

MORRISEY: We’re here today to talk about some very serious issues impacting West Virginia and our country. There’s no way around it, West Virginia ranks at the bottom of many public health metrics.

ANNA JOHANSEN BROWN: At the end of March, West Virginia Governor Patrick Morrisey announced the public health changes his state is planning to make. The governor spoke at a school from behind a lectern with a sign reading ‘MAHA Starts Here.’

MORRISEY: We lead most of the country in obesity stats, heart disease, diabetes. That’s the bad news. But we have good news. We have the power to change it.

One of the governor’s goals is to limit welfare funds going to unhealthy food items. Specifically, he wants to remove soda from the list of items eligible for purchase with SNAP in his state. Morrisey intends to file a waiver with the federal government requesting that change.

MORRISEY: Where tax dollars are involved we’re incentivizing consumption of healthier foods.

SNAP recipients may soon be leaving soda and candy on grocery store shelves in Idaho as well. The Idaho Legislature passed a bill on March 31 requiring the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare to request a waiver from the federal government. That waiver would allow the state to prohibit the use of food stamps to purchase soda and candy. Governor Brad Little is expected to sign the bill.

PERKINS: There's a lot of people that are pretty, pretty worked up and not happy about it.

Tyler Perkins is the executive director of the Idaho Falls Rescue Mission. He says many of the homeless individuals who arrive at the mission receive SNAP benefits.

PERKINS: I have countless stories of people who have come to us for either shelter or another service, and soda and candy is a large percentage of their diet. And how that can lead to a lot of health problems, can lead to a lot of irresponsible spending.

Mission residents receive three meals a day plus snacks, so staff members ask clients to drop their benefits when they arrive.

PERKINS: We believe we have a responsibility to provide what is necessary and healthy and move someone in a sustainable, healthy direction. So for us, it means helping people immediately deal with that addiction. And for a lot of people, it is like soda and candy and junk food is a real addiction.

Their goal is helping clients get back on their feet and be able to stay off welfare.

PERKINS: If we do our jobs well, people won't be getting back on SNAP.

But Perkins acknowledges it can be difficult for formerly homeless individuals to surrender the benefits they’ve relied on. And he points out that many of their clients have never been able to afford healthy food and don’t know how to cook wholesome meals.

PERKINS: There's a component in there that we're trying to be sensitive… It needs to be done with a lot of grace.

Idaho’s bill defines soda as any nonalcoholic beverage that contains natural or artificial sweeteners. But it does not include beverages that contain milk, are more than 50% fruit or vegetable juice, or require preparation from a concentrate. The bill also contains a detailed definition of candy. A similar Iowa bill lists what types of food would be eligible under SNAP instead of items that would not.

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr. says the federal government supports these types of bills. He spoke at the event in West Virginia with Governor Morrisey.

KENNEDY: The message I want to give to the country today and to all the other governors is get in line behind Governor Morrisey and apply for a waiver to my agency and we’re going to give it to you.

But critics of these efforts argue restricting what types of food SNAP recipients can buy strips them of dignity and autonomy. They also worry it may discourage grocery stores from accepting SNAP dollars.

ANGELA RACHIDI: I am sympathetic to the argument that legislators or lawmakers should not necessarily be the ones determining what specific products have a health benefit

Angela Rachidi is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. She understands the concern, but thinks it’s overblown.

RACHIDI: That said, I think there are certain products that are clearly harmful, and to me, lend itself to restrictions.

She notes that grocery stores already have to restrict certain products from SNAP dollars—things like alcohol and paper goods—and are able to do so easily.

RACHIDI: Sugary beverages have no nutritional value. It also does nothing to satisfy hunger, which is the point of SNAP.

Over the past few weeks, several conservative influencers on X simultaneously began posting talking points about how SNAP restrictions are government overreach. They also referenced President Donald Trump’s love for Diet Coke. Many of the posts used similar language and phrases.

The soda lobby group the American Beverage Association denied authorizing or paying for a coordinated campaign. But Rachidi says she wouldn’t be surprised if Big Soda is behind much of the opposition.

RACHIDI: In 2015 I testified in front of Congress on restrictions. And after that testimony, I got a call from a beverage lobby wanting to know if I had interest in writing about not favoring restrictions, which I thought was very strange, because I just testified in front of Congress in favor of restrictions. So that was pretty eye opening.

Roughly 1 in 8 Americans receive SNAP benefits and the most recent available data from the United States Department of Agriculture shows they spend the greatest portion of their benefits on soft drinks.

RACHIDI: And I definitely think there is kind of a behind the scenes push among beverage and grocery lobbies to not have these laws put into place. We're talking about billions, billions of dollars every year for an in federal, federal dollars that can only be used in their stores. And so you start to put restrictions on that. I can see how that would make these businesses nervous and that they would want to try to avoid that.

For WORLD, I’m Anna Johansen Brown.

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