43,000 fewer Mississippians are on SNAP after Congress and President Trump slashed funding ...Middle East

Mississippi and the U.S. are experiencing the steepest drop-off of participation in the nation’s largest anti-hunger program in nearly 30 years following federal cuts made last summer by Congress and President Donald Trump, experts say. 

In April, 43,000 fewer Mississippians had access to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program than nine months earlier. Mississippi’s decline of 12% in the program previously known as food stamps is slightly higher than the national average of 11%, according to recent data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. 

“And it’s not because the need is any lower,” said Ty Jones Cox, vice president for food assistance at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, during a July 22 press conference.

In fact, food insecurity in the U.S. is the highest it’s been in a decade, according to the most recent data. 

Regulations that Congress passed through the One Big Beautiful Bill Act and that Trump signed into law last July have changed the face of SNAP. Stricter work requirements subjected previously-exempt older adults and caregivers to more paperwork. An already burdened system became more strained, at a time when the same federal law posed new fines for states with high error rates in eligibility determinations. 

A payment error rate measures how accurately each state determines the number of SNAP dollars an eligible person receives. In May, Republican Gov. Tate Reeves praised the Mississippi Department of Human Services for lowering the state’s error rate and qualifying for a lower penalty. 

MDHS Communications Director Mark Jones previously told Mississippi Today the department was able to achieve this by providing more training for staff who determine if people are eligible to receive SNAP and by reminding recipients about the importance of updating income changes to ensure their paperwork is accurate. 

However, experts say it’s problematic that delaying or denying benefits to an eligible family does not count as an error.

“That creates an enormous incentive for states to slash their error rates by any means necessary,” Jones Cox said. “And that’s what we’re seeing.”

The decline is outpacing even the government’s predictions. Shortly after Congress passed Trump’s megabill last year, the Congressional Budget Office predicted SNAP enrollment would decrease by 2.4 million people nationwide. To date, enrollment has decreased by 4.5 million people. 

At least a third of those people are children, according to data from 19 states. Mississippi does not track data on children. 

Dr. Patricia Tibbs, president of the Mississippi chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics, said she worries about the effect that the decrease in enrollment will have on the next generation. Nutrition is one of the most influential determinants of health – and children are the most vulnerable.

“It’s children we’re talking about,” Tibbs told Mississippi Today. “They don’t choose their families’ income.”

Politicians should look at SNAP as a return on investment, Tibbs said. Access to healthy foods helps Mississippi children grow into productive citizens, saving the state millions of dollars on more complex issues that arise from inadequate nutrition. Tibbs also said increased investment in SNAP could boost the state’s workforce participation rate, currently the second-lowest in the country. 

“Hospitalizations, developmental services, special education, mental care, chronic disease treatment – those are all down the road, if we don’t focus on nutrition,” Tibbs said.

‘It’s a lose-lose situation’

In 2019, Debra Expose of Jackson, a single mother of five children ages 2 through 12, began facing severe financial hardship after divorcing the father of her eldest daughter. Expose said she doesn’t receive child support for any of her children, despite being their primary caregiver and picking up most of the costs of child rearing. 

Over the years, Expose has worked at Walmart, Kroger, Xerox and for the city of Jackson as a crossing guard. Most recently, she worked for the United States Postal Service. She resigned last year due to the lack of family leave, flexible hours and affordable childcare. 

SNAP has been a lifeline for Expose as she looks for a more family-friendly job. Now, she said she worries that federal cuts and pressure on states to lower error rates will mean increased red tape that could put food out of reach for her family. 

Expose said paperwork delays are already commonplace. Every six months at her recertification appointments, she routinely gets kicked off the program for one to three months, she said. Even when she submits her paperwork early, caseworkers do not get to her case in time to prevent her from losing coverage, she said. That has meant making difficult decisions, such as whether to put food on the table or keep the lights on. 

And sometimes, losing one means losing the other. 

“Am I gonna lose my power that’s gonna help me keep the food fresh and able to be eaten? It’s a lose-lose situation,” Expose said. 

Safia Malin is policy director for the nonprofit One Voice, a Jackson-based civic engagement group. She said hearing from people such as Expose should be a central part of how lawmakers develop public policies. In Mississippi, it’s not. Formal opportunities for constituents to provide testimony do not exist in the state Legislature. 

“There is so much we can learn from data and numbers, but also from real live human beings who are withstanding the impacts and figuring out how to make ends meet,” Malin said. “We know that the unfortunate reality for so many folks is that a reduction in benefits for them just means they’ll be forced to go without.”

Although the Mississippi Legislature doesn’t have the power to reverse or delay federal cuts to social safety net programs, Malin urged the Mississippi Department of Human Services to make sure it is not lowering its error rate by cutting eligible people. 

Malin also recommended the Legislature adopt a system called “simplified reporting,” as every other state has done, to administer SNAP. Malin believes it would reduce the number of errors – without cutting eligible families – and save the state money that could go back into the program. 

As situations such as Expose’s become more common, repercussions will be felt for decades, said Dr. Andrew Racine, president of the American Academy of Pediatrics. 

He said that includes not only the long-term health conditions resulting from inadequate nutrition but also the effects of chronic stress on children living in food-insecure homes. Studies show that toxic stress, including prolonged and extreme economic hardship, can impair cognitive development and leave children more vulnerable to physical disorders such as cardiovascular diseases and diabetes, as well as mental health issues such as depression and alcoholism. 

“To the extent that we are making policy decisions today about foregoing the opportunity to feed hungry children, we are having consequences that will haunt us going forward a generation from now,” Racine said. “And it’s entirely avoidable.”

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