Murkowski’s Absurd Plan Could Leave Millions Hungry

Summary

Bulwark Takes: Murkowski’s Absurd Plan Could Leave Millions Hungry
Release Date: July 2, 2025

In this compelling episode of Bulwark Takes, host Sam Stein engages in a critical discussion with Arthur Delaney, a respected HuffPost reporter, about the Republican-led legislative efforts to cut the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). The conversation delves deep into the mechanics of the proposed bill, its implications for rural America, and the controversial maneuvering involving Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska. The following summary captures the essence of their conversation, enriched with notable quotes and structured insights.

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1. Introduction to the SNAP Program

Sam Stein initiates the conversation by highlighting the significance of SNAP, setting the stage for a nuanced discussion on its potential dismantling.

Sam Stein [01:01]: "We're talking about the big beautiful bill, but specifically a provision in it to go after SNAP, which is food benefits for poor people."

To clarify, Arthur Delaney explains:

Arthur Delaney [01:52]: "SNAP is the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. It's the federal government's biggest flagship food security program. It basically eradicated starvation in the United States after it was ramped up in the 20th century."

He emphasizes the program's impact:

Arthur Delaney [02:09]: "20 million households get SNAP benefits, which are a few hundred dollars a month depending on how many people are in the household. So it's a big, important and very responsive program."

2. Understanding SNAP: Importance and Cost

The duo delves into the financial aspects of SNAP, underscoring its role and the fiscal responsibilities tied to it.

Arthur Delaney [02:30]: "The federal government entirely pays the cost of benefits while states administer, you know, check eligibility and sign people up."

Discussing the annual expenditure:

Arthur Delaney [02:42]: "It's about $100 billion annually. So it's a big program and its cost has gone up a lot."

He traces the expansion of SNAP:

Arthur Delaney [02:42]: "It was expanded a little bit under Barack Obama and a lot under Joe Biden. They, you know, Congress ramped it up in response to the pandemic, and then Joe Biden essentially made those expansions permanent."

3. Republican Proposals to Cut SNAP

The conversation shifts to the Republican strategy of targeting SNAP to finance tax cuts, highlighting the legislative maneuvers involved.

Sam Stein [03:03]: "Big pool of money going to needy people. Naturally, it's ripe to get raided for this Republican bill, which they needed to finance tax cuts for."

Arthur Delaney elaborates on the proposals:

Arthur Delaney [03:20]: "So Republicans have always wanted to kill SNAP, basically, but they can't ever do it because everyone likes it. And they're not usually working in budget reconciliation, but this time they are, and they have these, you know, $4 trillion in tax cuts. So SNAP went along with Medicaid in the pool of things they wanted to raid to help offset the cost of the taxes."

He explains the core of the House and Senate proposals:

Arthur Delaney [03:53]: "The big one was to make states have to pay a share of the cost of SNAP benefits... House proposal would have every state do this automatically. And the Senate proposal would only do it for states that have high error rates, which is high rates of improperly overpaying SNAP."

4. The Murkowski Provision and Its Implications

A pivotal moment in the discussion revolves around Senator Lisa Murkowski's involvement and the intricate provisions introduced to secure her support.

Sam Stein [05:03]: "They needed to win Lisa Murkowski's vote for this bill. And in order to win her boat vote, they needed to essentially carve out SNAP cuts for Alaska to make sure that the state wasn't screwed, or at least that was her request."

Arthur Delaney explains the legislative complexity:

Arthur Delaney [05:55]: "They put in this whole formula to make it look even more obscure from what was their obvious intention. And the parliamentarian said, okay, you've jumped through enough hoops here that we'll keep this in. They finished this up like a minute before the Senate voted on, and they passed it."

5. Reactions and Controversies

The episode highlights the backlash and confusion within the Republican ranks regarding the murky provisions introduced.

Sam Stein [10:37]: "They tightened it on Murkowski's behalf. But it's not only benefiting Murkowski, by the way that they wrote it, it's going to benefit... other states, bigger states."

Arthur Delaney critiques the legislative haste:

Arthur Delaney [11:15]: "It was for Murkowski. And with these... it's really the slapdash, ad hoc nature of the legislative process for this bill. Like it's really rushed for no reason and as a result, it's very sloppy."

The House Rules Committee's reaction is also discussed:

Arthur Delaney [10:09]: "The House Agriculture Chair was there as a witness. He's just like, well, you have to ask the senators why they did that."

6. Potential Outcomes and Consequences

The dialogue shifts to the possible ramifications of the bill passing, especially for states caught in the middle of the proposed error rate thresholds.

Arthur Delaney [07:19]: "They put in this whole formula to make it look even more obscure from what was their obvious intention."

Arthur Delaney [08:03]: "It's billions of dollars. It's just a massive."

The concept of “donut holes” is introduced to explain the catch-22 faced by medium-performing states:

Sam Stein [08:27]: "There's a donut hole in the middle of medium performing states who will just either have to say, you know what, we got to get our shit in order and make sure that there's less errors, or we should just absolutely go in the opposite direction and make this error ridden so that we don't lose money."

7. Conclusion and Insights

Wrapping up the discussion, Sam Stein and Arthur Delaney reflect on the broader implications of the bill and the challenges ahead.

Arthur Delaney [12:41]: "This would reduce enrollment by several million... millions of people would have fewer benefits. It's I think it's best to think of it as really rolling back the gains from the Obama and Biden eras, or at least trying to."

Sam Stein [13:13]: "It's really a difficult to watch time. Critically important reporting from you and others. Thank you."

Key Takeaways

• SNAP's Significance: As the largest federal nutrition assistance program, SNAP plays a crucial role in eradicating hunger and supporting millions of American households.

• Republican Strategy: The GOP's attempt to slash SNAP funding is part of a broader agenda to finance substantial tax cuts, leveraging budget reconciliation to push through contentious provisions.

• Legislative Maneuvering: The introduction of complex formulas to secure Senator Murkowski's support underscores the ad hoc and rushed nature of the bill's creation, leading to widespread confusion and criticism.

• Impact on States: States are poised to bear significant financial burdens under the proposed changes, especially those with high error rates in SNAP administration. This could result in millions losing benefits and exacerbate food insecurity.

• Future Implications: If enacted, the bill could undo decades of progress in food security, highlighting the precarious intersection of politics and vital social programs.

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This episode of Bulwark Takes serves as a crucial examination of the interplay between legislative tactics and social welfare programs, shedding light on policies that could have profound impacts on millions of Americans.

Transcript

[Unknown Speaker 1]

Rural communities are being squeezed from every side, from rising health care costs to crumbling hospitals, from attacks on public schools to the fight for paid family and medical leave. Farmers and small businesses are reeling from the trade war. And now Project 2025 is back with a plan to finish what Elon Musk started. Trump and the Republicans won rural votes, then turned their backs on us. Join the One Country Project for the Rural Progress Summit, July 8th through the 10th. This free virtual event brings together leaders like Senator Heidi Heikamp, Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Governor Andy Beshear, and others for real talk and real solutions. Together, we'll tackle the most urgent issues facing rural America. Register today or learn [e-mail].

[Sam Stein]

Packages by Expedia. You were made to be rechargeable. We were made to package flights, hotels and hammocks for less. Expedia made to travel. Hey guys. Sam Stein managing Out at the Bulwark, I'm joined by fan favorite YouTube pinup model and HuffPost reporter Arthur Delaney. You know him from prior Bulwark youtubes addressing partners policy issues that are happening on Capitol Hill. That's what we're going to talk about today. We're talking about the big beautiful bill, but specifically a provision in it to go after snap, which is food benefits for poor people. So, Arthur, let's talk a little bit. Let's just kind of set the stage before we get into the ridiculous thing that happened yesterday. But just tell people who might not know what is snap?

[Arthur Delaney]

SNAP is the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. It's the federal government's biggest big flagship food security program. It basically eradicated starvation in the United States after it was ramped up in the 20th century.

[Sam Stein]

That was a good thing, right?

[Arthur Delaney]

Starvation's bad, so eradicating it is good. Just confirm. And yeah, 20 million households get SNAP benefits, which are a few hundred dollars a month depending on how many people are in the household. So it's a big, important and very responsive program. So you lose your job or something, you get unemployment maybe, but you can definitely get snap.

[Sam Stein]

Okay, and who pays for it?

[Arthur Delaney]

The federal government entirely pays the cost of benefits while states administer, you know, check eligibility and sign people up.

[Sam Stein]

How much does it cost?

[Arthur Delaney]

It's about $100 billion annually. So it's a big program and its cost has gone up a lot. Important for people to know that it was expanded a little bit under Barack Obama and a lot under Jo Biden. They, you know, Congress ramped it up in response to the pandemic, and then Joe Biden essentially Made those expansions permanent.

[Sam Stein]

Big pool of money going to needy people. Naturally, it's ripe to get raided for this Republican bill, which they needed to finance tax cuts for. So what did the House do in their version, and what did the Senate do in its version?

[Arthur Delaney]

So Republicans have always wanted to kill snap, basically, but they can't ever do it because everyone likes it. And they're not usually working in budget reconciliation, but this time they are, and they have these, you know, $4 trillion in tax cuts. So SNAP went along with Medicaid in the pool of things they wanted to raid to help offset the cost of the taxes. So there are a bunch of provisions in there, but the big one was to make states have to pay a share of the cost of SNAP benefits.

[Sam Stein]

Right.

[Arthur Delaney]

That's big money. $100 billion across the country. So any state's going to have potentially hundreds of millions, even billions of dollars that it would be on the hook for under this proposal. It would give states a strong incentive to trim enrollment, which would in turn reduce federal spending on SNAP by a large amount. And that the House proposal would have every state do this automatically. And the Senate proposal would only do it for states that have high error rates, which is high rates of improperly overpaying snaps.

[Sam Stein]

Got you.

[Arthur Delaney]

The Senate proposal is the one that has won out.

[Sam Stein]

All right. So the Senate process is not as blunt as the House one, which means less people would suffer for lack of food. And they created an incentive structure which, you know, if you believe in cutting snap, this incentive structure probably makes some sense. Right. It's you're not administering the program effectively. If you aren't, then you're going to lose some federal funding for or you're going to have to cover it yourself, therefore administer it more effectively. It's an incentive to get the states to do better. So if you're for these reforms, this probably makes some sense.

[Arthur Delaney]

Yeah. And Republicans have a point that states really have done whatever they can to sign people up because that the money comes into your state, goes to your grocery stores, improves your tax base. It's totally good for states. So they have maximized enrollment to the extent policy.

[Sam Stein]

Right. Because they don't foot the bill and the feds foot the bill. And so it's not the only thing you have to pay for if you're the state is the paperwork and the time to administer the program. All right. But this is what happened. Which brings us to why we have you on this program. They needed to win Lisa Murkowski's vote for this bill. And in order to win her boat vote, they needed to essentially carve out SNAP cuts for Alaska to make sure that the state wasn't screwed, or at least that was her request. What did she get them to do?

[Arthur Delaney]

So you can't. So. Exactly. So she wasn't going to vote for this if they didn't make it nicer. Alaska, it so happens, has the very highest SNAP error rate. It was like 24% in 2024.

[Sam Stein]

Wow.

[Arthur Delaney]

So, but the problem is you're using budget reconciliation, where there are rules against putting in pure policy that only has incidental budgetary effects.

[Sam Stein]

So you can't, you can't single out a state and be like, this is for Alaska only.

[Arthur Delaney]

Exactly. So they said, well, this shall apply. There will be an exemption that delays implementation of this for any state that has an error rate in excess of 20% after you multiply the state error rate in 2025 or 26 by 1.5. So they, they put in this whole formula to make it look even more obscure from what was their obvious intention. And the parliamentarian said, okay, you've jumped through enough hoops here that we'll keep this in. They, they finished this up like a minute before the Senate voted on, and they passed it, and now, and now the House is going to vote on it. And it's really wacky.

[Sam Stein]

Let's explain why it's wacky, because it's. I just want people to understand this. You are now being rewarded if your state has a higher error rate above that threshold of 20% or what is it, 13% times 1.5. Whatever, 20%.

[Arthur Delaney]

They couldn't just say. They couldn't just say 13%. Okay, that would be too silly. They had to make it a little math formula.

[Sam Stein]

Okay. But yeah, if your state has a.

[Arthur Delaney]

High error rate, not even as high as Alaska's, but if it's high, then you don't have to pay any.

[Sam Stein]

The Feds will still cover it all. So the worst performing administrative states will get a full Fed share of the SNAP cuts. And in the Senate bill, if your error rate's under 6% or so, you also will get the Feds to cover the cost of SNAP. But if you're in that middle, the 6 to the 20, give or take, you're screwed. That's okay. That's right, the Feds. And how much would you have to. How much would you have to shoulder if you're a state in that middle?

[Arthur Delaney]

It depends on the state, but it's like billions of dollars. It's just a Massive.

[Sam Stein]

So there's a donut hole in the middle of medium performing states who will just either have to say, you know what, we got to get our shit in order and make sure that there's less errors, or we should just absolutely go in the opposite direction and make this error ridden so that we don't lose money.

[Arthur Delaney]

Right, and so you could do that by paying SNAP benefits to people who are ineligible or just overpaying them. So just, just add money to people's SNAP benefits and boom, you are in the top tier of error states and therefore exempt.

[Sam Stein]

Who determines, who determines the error rates?

[Arthur Delaney]

Well, it's, it's the Food and Nutrition Service over at the usda.

[Sam Stein]

Okay. So the feds at least have some say. It's not like the states are determining their own error rate.

[Arthur Delaney]

Yeah. And presumably the Trump administration would look for perhaps extralegal ways to dissuade states from gaming this in the obvious way that Congress has let them and probably would wind up in court because they're not fixing it. And they're.

[Sam Stein]

Why are they not. Why are they not fixing it?

[Arthur Delaney]

Well, they're not fixing it as of the time of this recording when they're about to vote.

[Sam Stein]

Yeah. We should be clear. This is recording at 1:20ish on Wednesday.

[Arthur Delaney]

They just want to pass the bill. They don't really care what's in this bill.

[Sam Stein]

Do they think they could just go, do they think they could fix this in like subsequent legislation?

[Arthur Delaney]

No, because why would Democrats let them fix this state? That advent. That's advantageous for Democratic states, like immediately a bunch of big blue states are off the hook.

[Sam Stein]

Like what?

[Arthur Delaney]

Including like New York and New Jersey, states that are very populous. It's gonna reduce the savings of this proposal, which was like $41 billion, by quite a lot. And you're not going to be doing this in reconciliation unless I guess they do in a future reconciliation bill, which they have.

[Sam Stein]

They do have. They have a couple. They might have one or two more options on that.

[Arthur Delaney]

But, but it came over from the Senate and House Republicans were immediately just like, lol. What?

[Sam Stein]

Yeah. What was the react. What was the reaction in the House when they saw this thing?

[Arthur Delaney]

We got immediate reaction because the House Rules Committee met and the House Agriculture Chair was there as a witness. He's just like, well, you have to ask the senators why they did that.

[Sam Stein]

We know why they did it.

[Arthur Delaney]

And a minute later he was like, well, I'm in politics, I know why they did it. They had to get votes. And Chip Roy, who kind of hates the bill, he's one of the right wingers. He said this is just an absurd policy. You know, let's call balls and strikes. That's a ball.

[Sam Stein]

Yeah. If they were to change it in the House and send it back to the Senate and they're not going to, but let's say they did, would Murkowski. Do you think Murkowski would rescind her vote?

[Arthur Delaney]

Well, they, they'd have to change it in a way that it doesn't do what it does. Right? Yeah. I mean, that would. You'd lose Murkowski if you lost this provision because to tighten it so that it only benefited Murkowski. It wouldn't be.

[Sam Stein]

But they didn't tighten it. They, they tighten it on Murkowski's behalf. But it's not only benefiting Murkowski, by the way that they wrote it, it's going to benefit, as you noted, other states, bigger states.

[Arthur Delaney]

That's what they had to do because of the rules. So it was for Murkowski. And with these. Carry on. It's just a. It really shows you the slap dash, ad hoc nature of the legislative process for this bill. Like it's really rushed for no reason and as a result, it's very sloppy. This is just the thing that bubbled up after the text came out yesterday. I don't know if anyone had seen it before then, but I'm sure other stuff like this is going to pop out of this 900 page bill in the, you know, next few days.

[Sam Stein]

Yeah, they call that an industry problems the nut graph. This illustrates the profoundly disjointed nature in which this bill was produced. And it underscores just how little the lawmakers understood about the bill they passed.

[Arthur Delaney]

Well, yeah, I'm an editor. You're making it sound corny, but yes.

[Sam Stein]

Well, okay, fine. Screw you, Arthur. Last time you're on this YouTube channel. No, thank you. No, I didn't mean to ask you like that. Thank you very much for doing this. It's really interesting reporting. You know, honestly, SNAP does not always get top billing. It's an incredibly important federal and state administered program. There's profound changes that are about to happen here. I guess I would just ask one last question, like let's say this does go through and even with these weird carve outs in these donut holes, like what are we looking at in terms of people who could go hungry?

[Arthur Delaney]

This would reduce enrollment by several million. It's. It has over. There are overlapping provisions that I think for some people get lower benefits, but millions of people would have fewer benefits. It's I think it's best to think of it as really rolling back the gains from the Obama and Biden eras, or at least trying to. And we'll just have to see how it shakes out. I feel like there's the Trump administration is going to allow a lot of governors to experiment, like with banning soda. Right. So it's snap is changing a lot right now.

[Sam Stein]

No, it's, it's really, it's a difficult to watch time. Critically important reporting from you and others. Thank you. Really, really do appreciate you coming on here explaining this. We'll get you back on the feed. And thank you guys for watching. Appreciate that as well. Subscribe to the feed and we'll talk to you soon.