Congresswoman Chellie Pingree is criticizing a Republican cost-cutting measure that could require Maine to pay tens of millions of dollars for food assistance.
Currently, the federal government covers 100% of the benefits paid out through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which is also known as SNAP or food stamps. While states help cover SNAP administration costs, Republicans in Congress are accusing states of not doing enough to control costs.
House Republicans are looking to cut more than $200 billion from SNAP as part of their efforts — alongside President Trump — to extend the 2017 tax cuts. So they've proposed requiring states to pick up anywhere from 5%-25% of SNAP costs, depending on each state's "payment error rates."
Maine's combined over-payment and under-payment rate for SNAP benefits was 13.5% in fiscal year 2023, according to figures from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. That was above the national average of 11.7% and, if the current House proposal was in place, would land Maine the highest cost-sharing bracket of 25%.
Pingree, a progressive Democrat representing Maine's 1st District, told colleagues on the House Agriculture Committee that could cost Maine state government nearly $100 million. And she described the proposal as a "backdoor way of sending this program into a death spiral."
"And let's not sugarcoat what this bill is," Pingree said. "It's a $300 billion assault on struggling families, seniors, children and veterans all to fund tax breaks for billionaires and corporations."
The Republican proposal also seeks to: expand the work requirements for able-bodied adults, prohibit SNAP benefits for asylum seekers and other non-citizens other than Green Card holders, narrows state waivers from work requirements, among other changes.
“For far too long, the SNAP program has drifted from a bridge to support American households in need to a permanent destination riddled with bureaucratic inefficiencies, misplaced incentives, and limited accountability," Rep. Glenn ‘GT’ Thompson, the Pennsylvania Republican who chairs the House Agriculture Committee, said in a statement outlining the SNAP proposals. "This portion of the One Big, Beautiful Bill restores the program’s original intent, offering a temporary helping hand while encouraging work, cracking down on loopholes exploited by states, and protecting taxpayer dollars while supporting the hardworking men and women of American agriculture."
But Pingree accused her GOP colleagues of using "gimmicks to pretend we are not cutting food from hungry people" while putting additional pressure on state and local governments to fill the need.
"We are not just taking food away from hungry people in this crazy reconciliation thing that we are doing in the dark of night and all through the day," Pingree said Wednesday as the committee resumed its work after a late-night session on Tuesday. "We are actually undermining the entire tax structure and funding in our country. And we are pretending nobody is going to notice or that is somehow is going to be easy . . . and that every state has plenty of money to cover it."
More than 170,000 Maine residents — or roughly 13% of the state — were receiving SNAP benefits as of January 2025. A representative for the Maine Department of Health and Human Services, which administers the SNAP program in the state, did not immediately respond to a request for comment on potential impacts from the proposed changes.
House Republicans are rushing to finish work on the budget reconciliation bill before the Memorial Day recess.
