Washington Wednesday: Faith and food benefits

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LINDSAY MAST, HOST: It’s Wednesday the 18th of June.

Glad to have you along for today’s edition of The World and Everything in It. Good morning, I’m Lindsay Mast.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher.

Time now for Washington Wednesday.

President Donald Trump’s legislative agenda is in the Senate this week. As Congress evaluates the One Big Beautiful Bill Act of 2025, lawmakers consider scaling back bloated government programs. That includes politically sensitive ones like the Supplemental Nutritional Aid Program, SNAP.

MAST: The program started out as Food Stamps during President Lyndon Johnson’s War on Poverty. Currently, more than 40 million people take part in the program.

SNAP roughly doubled in cost around the time of COVID, and the price tag has remained above 100 billion dollars a year since. Is it all well spent?

WORLD Washington Bureau reporter Leo Briceno asked lawmakers of faith about it:

PROTESTOR: Don’t let nobody turn me around, turn me around, turn me around…

LEO BRICENO: Last Tuesday, hundreds of protesters came to the U.S. capitol with a faith-based proposition: Christian lawmakers should oppose shrinking government food benefits for the poor.

One of the lawmakers facilitating the event, Delaware Senator Chris Coons framed the argument this way:

COONS: In Luke 10, a lawyer says to Jesus ‘who is my neighbor?’ And that’s the question we pose to this bill coming over to the Senate from the House.

Coons, a Democrat, argues Scripture’s authority compels the government to do what it can do to help those in need.

Lawmakers of faith on both sides of the aisle are split on the bill's changes to the SNAP program:

THOMPSON: Are you a Christian, are you a man of faith? I sure am.

That’s Congressman Glenn Thompson of Pennsylvania, Chairman of the House Agriculture committee. His committee drafted the language on the changes to SNAP. He believes Republican attempts to trim the program don’t conflict with Biblical mandates.

THOMPSON: When Christ was instructing his apostles, his disciples, which is what the scripture is based on, he wasn’t speaking to the government. He was speaking to the church…

In its current form, the legislative package would push some of SNAP’s funding onto the states, starting in 2028. It would also expand already-existing work requirements. Under current law, the program requires individuals age 18 to 53 who do not have children to work a minimum of 20 hours per week to qualify for benefits for a whole year. The bill before the Senate would extend those work requirements up to age 65 and include parents with children over the age of 6.

The bill also explicitly forbids illegal aliens from getting SNAP benefits—although visa recipients and green card holders will still be eligible.

Through these changes and others in the Agriculture portion of the Big Beautiful Bill, Republicans hope to trim government spending by $230 billion over 10 years.

But it’s not just the government that would have to trim its spending…

SMITH: Basically, I made too much money,

That’s Heaven Smith, a college student at West Virginia University studying nutrition and food. When she was a part of a work-study program, Smith met SNAP’s 20-hour work requirement. But then she changed jobs to work for a hospital and was no longer eligible, even though her cost of living wasn’t that much different. Instead of buying fresh protein, fruits, and vegetables, she started opting for the $5 menu at Wendy’s and scaling back her gas budget to have more money for food.

Today, thanks to her community and a more flexible schedule, Smith has been able to make ends meet and has taken on a second job.

SMITH: I’ve been able to like, actually budget and take time to figure out how [to] meal plan and things like that, so now I’m kind of in a way I’m kind of back to the way I was eating without SNAP.

Some Christians working in food-provision ministries worry that Republicans in Congress are setting the stage for painful adjustments, not only for individuals like Smith, but also for families.

CHO: None of us are suggesting that the SNAP program is perfect.

Eugene Cho, president and CEO of Bread for the World, a Christian advocacy group, believes SNAP’s benefits already serve the country’s most needy. Having spent 20 years as a pastor, Cho says he’s seen firsthand how hunger plagues families even in the United States. He worries that the changes to the program will hurt some of the country’s poorest households.

CHO: Eighty-six percent of all SNAP benefits go to households with gross monthly income at or below the poverty level. So, in other words, it is being utilized by the very people that need it the most.

In 2025, the poverty level for individuals is $15,600, and $32,000 for a household of four, although those dollars go further in some communities than others. Just under 40 million Americans live below that threshold.

Part of Cho’s concern is that Republicans are prioritizing tax cuts and other objectives at the expense of programs like SNAP.

CHO: I’m a fiscal conservative. I think it’s really important for our nation to prioritize—as one of its priorities—the reduction of our national debt. That said, I think that…It feels like we’re trying to make some advancement on our national debt on the backs of those who are being most impacted by levels of food insecurity and poverty,

But some Republicans in Congress say the bill protects benefits specifically for those who need them while still prioritizing the program’s financial efficiency.

JOHNSON: Vulnerable people are not being thrown off the program. It’s an indisputable fact that the work requirements do not affect pregnant women, those with young children at home, seniors, those with disabilities, or people living in areas of high unemployment.

That’s representative Dusty Johnson of South Dakota. He too is on the Agriculture Committee and describes himself as a man of faith.

JOHNSON: So many people in this town say, ‘Show me your budget, and I’ll show you your values. Our country spends hundreds of billions of dollars every year taking care of the most vulnerable among us. It is a remarkable investment in our people. We know that to preserve these programs we need to focus our resources on the most vulnerable, which is indeed what the reconciliation package does.

And other Republicans say preserving resources overall helps the government tackle an even bigger problem: the federal deficit. I asked Congressman Chip Roy of Texas how his fiscal conservatism squares with the faith-based protests at the Capitol. Roy is a leading voice in Congress calling for Republicans to do everything they can to trim government expenses through the Big Beautiful Bill.

ROY: I think when you say the government should be ‘equitable—’ equal justice under law, sure. Equitable in terms of distribution of resources? That’s not my worldview. I don’t think that’s consistent with the Christian worldview.

If Congress can find a way to prevent adding to the country’s $36 trillion debt, Roy believes Republicans should take it.

Last year, the country spent just north of one trillion dollars just on interest payments—roughly the same amount it spent on defense.

ROY: The government right now is unsustainable. You want to be Christian about it—what’s Christian about saddling an entire generation or more of Americans with untenable amounts of debt and interest and inflation?

It’s up to the Senate now to approve or amend the House’s proposed changes to SNAP. Last week, the Senate Agriculture Committee unveiled its own language which slightly loosens requirements presented in the House.

None of the changes to SNAP would become final until Congress passes the entire Big Beautiful Bill, something GOP leadership says it wants to see by July 4th.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Leo Briceno in Washington.

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