Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. wants to make it harder for poor Americans to buy unhealthy food. Together with Agriculture Secretary Brook Rollins, he is asking some 15 states to submit waivers to bar beneficiaries of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) from using those funds to buy soda and other specific items.

Unfortunately, this approach is unproductive, in part because it does nothing to make it easier for Americans to buy healthy food.

The nation does face an obesity crisis. But banning SNAP beneficiaries from buying a Hostess cake at Safeway will not address it in any significant way. Families on SNAP purchase approximately the same amount of unhealthy food as those not enrolled in the program. Restricting SNAP is about stigmatizing people living in poverty, not helping them.

A 2023 Cleveland Clinic study found that almost half of survey respondents considered the cost of healthy food to be the largest barrier to healthier diets. President Donald Trump’s tariffs are expected to drive up the cost of groceries even further, especially fresh fruits and vegetables.

SNAP is already inadequate to pay for the rising cost of groceries. SNAP provides only about $6 per person per day in food assistance. To make better food purchases more feasible for recipients, we need to increase SNAP payments, not cut them by imposing new rules and shifting responsibility to the states, as some Republican members of Congress are now looking to do.

Evidence supports this strategy: When the child tax credit was expanded following the pandemic, low-income parents bought more healthy food with their extra cash.

Poorer Americans (like richer ones) do buy too much junk food and consume too much ultra-processed crap — but the reasons are just as important as the facts. Poor families often lack access to stores that sell healthy fruits and vegetables. Meanwhile, billboards for fast food restaurants blanket poorer neighborhoods, with images of attractive people savoring deep fried treats and pounding highly caffeinated sugary drinks.

Studies show poverty leads to increases in illness due to factors including the stress and financial strain of surviving with a shrinking safety-net and a lack of decent, stable paid work. With less access to healthy food and crafty ad campaigns targeting low-income youth, it’s no wonder poor families dedicate a large portion of their spending to sugary and sodium-enriched junk.

One model for expanding SNAP recipients’ access to better, healthier food is already in place. The Food Insecurity Nutrition Incentive, launched as part of the 2014 Farm Bill, distributed more than $73 million to local SNAP incentive projects between 2015 and 2018. The program is now known as the Gus Schumacher Nutrition Incentive Program (GusNIP).

In 2019, Congress set aside $250 million to fund GusNIP. Allocations since have varied but the program continues. GusNIP has a competitive grant program that funds state and local non-profit organizations to provide financial nutrition incentives that subsidize purchases of fruits and vegetables for SNAP customers. Less than 1% of SNAP beneficiaries can access GusNIP, however. We must expand the program.

SNAP’s “Double Bucks” program, now operating in more than 25 states, also helps local farmers and families. This program provides SNAP participants with matching funds to purchase locally grown produce. Congress should also pass the Supporting All Healthy Options When Purchasing Produce (SHOPP) Act, a bipartisan bill backed by Republican Senator Tommy Tuberville, R-AL, that increases SNAP incentives to buy frozen fruits and vegetables.

If Kennedy wants to boost healthy eating, he should address nationwide poor nutrition at its root by boosting programs that drive consumption of whole foods, fruits and vegetables. We should teach healthier cooking practices. We should reduce the sticker shelf price tags of healthy groceries while encouraging buying fresh and frozen vegetables.

As Kennedy and Rollins tour the nation, they’ll learn that good jobs are scarce. Child care is difficult to find. Grocery stores with decent produce are not on most corners. Life is tough already, and we should help families in need leverage wide use of SNAP.

SNAP restrictions strip low-income families of their dignity. People know what’s good for them. And when you empower them to make healthier choices, they do.

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Vijay Das is a writer and advocate in Washington, D.C., who previously served as a legislative director for a member of Congress and led congressional campaigns to end hunger and expand healthy school meals. This column was produced for Progressive Perspectives, a project of The Progressive magazine, and distributed by Tribune News Service.

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