What began as a big-hearted, one-day food collection in Salisbury turned into a spirited protest about what demonstrators called “devastating and cruel” cuts to food and health assistance programs. The protest called for Maryland 1st District Rep. Andy Harris, who is also a doctor, to step up and “do his job.” They picked the right guy, perhaps more than they realized. He certainly has the power to help with SNAP, more so than nearly any other Congressman, but his allegiance is divided.
On Nov. 6, more than three dozen people from across three Eastern Shore counties gathered outside Harris’s Salisbury district office to collect food donations. They also demanded that Congress immediately restore funding for the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).
That program ground to a halt Nov. 1, leaving millions of Americans without money they rely on to eat, due to a federal government shutdown triggered because Republicans and Democrats could not agree on a Republican-sponsored spending plan that would deeply slash spending for social services. In Maryland about 680,000 receive SNAP benefits, 270,000 are children.
The spur of the moment food drive was organized by groups from Talbot, Dorchester and Wicomico counties, who collected and delivered 653 pounds of food to the Eastern Shore branch of the Maryland Food Bank. The event’s deeper purpose was to call attention to the shutdown of SNAP, a program that helps feed 42 million Americans. In Talbot County alone, 3,700 people currently receive SNAP payments, including 1,430 children.
As SNAP food stamp payments remain suspended in many states, more than two dozen states and several civic organizations filed lawsuits challenging the Trump Administration’s claim that it lacks the emergency reserves needed to make full payments. (Prior Presidents, including Trump in his first term, never claimed this.) Two federal judges ordered full SNAP benefits to resume, but the Trump administration has once again appealed the rulings to the U.S. Supreme Court to avoid feeding the hungry. The Supreme Court temporarily stayed the order to resume SNAP funding.
What does this have to do with Rep. Andy Harris?
First, the ”N” in the word SNAP is “nutrition”. You would think that a Congressman with an MD behind his name would approach the SNAP funding issue with more empathy than the ordinary lawmaker.
Second, and far more important, he chairs the very powerful Appropriations subcommittee having jurisdiction over funding for SNAP and the Department of Agriculture. He is the man. I worked for such an appropriations subcommittee chairman for many years. I can tell you that no other member, House or Senate, Democrat or Republican, with such power would sit back and let their constituents go hungry without his summoning Agriculture and White House staff to his office to explain themselves, especially if the President is of the same party. After all, no president wants to put a powerful member of his party, especially a powerful one, at risk of defeat.
However, Dr. Harris’ problem is divided allegiance. He also chairs the ultra-conservative Freedom Caucus, which earlier this year proposed cutting SNAP funding by $290 billion over the next decade and toughening eligibility requirements. In a choice between feeding his constituents and advancing the agenda of the Freedom Caucus and Donald Trump, Dr. Harris has apparently chosen the latter. What good is power if you won’t use it to protect and serve your constituents?
In Maryland, state leaders stepped in to help cushion the blow. Gov. Wes Moore announced the allocation of $62 million in state funds to ensure that Maryland’s 680,000 SNAP recipients receive full benefits for November. Yet the Department of Agriculture ordered the states to stop trying to make up all the difference and to claw back any funds they advanced. Otherwise, severe penalties on states would follow. (Picture snatching food from a hungry child’s mouth.) The Department of Agriculture’s mixed messages created such chaos in the SNAP program, that it is not clear if Agriculture is also attempting to block Maryland from using its own funds to feed its needy. (Doing so is of doubtful legality.)
It’s time for you to pick up the phone, Andy, use your influence, and make clear to the White House and Secretary of Agriculture that letting Americans go hungry is not an option –- SNAP must keep feeding families, now
Jim Bruce
St. Michaels
jeff morton says
Andy Harris never has and never will put the people he is supposed to represent ahead of his pals in DC.
It has always been a mystery to me how this clown gets reelected every year.
Jim Bruce says
I have wondered the same thing. Freshman Congressmen have done more than Andy in his long tenure.
Lucy Miziolek says
I couldn’t agree more. Thank you for your comment Jeff.
I believe Dr. Harris is a disgrace to our country, state, district, and county. His actions speak volumes.
Francine DeSanctis says
I suppose as a doctor we come to believe compassion and the Hippocratic oath are part of Harris’s DNA. Not so. He has less interest in helping those in pain or suffering than a fly.
Redistricting cannot come soon enough!
Caroline Thomas says
He needs to be voted OUT.
Bob Kopec says
Harris has allegiance to Donald Trump. Trump has refused the Supreme Court order to restore funds so that children can get food. Harris will not go against Trump. Vote out Andy ‘Handgun’ Harris at the next election.
Steve Clineburg says
Personally, I don’t think that Maryland should emulate the example of Texas to rig the electoral balance. Democrats and principled independent voters need to get out a message that will RESONATE with 1st District voters to the extent that Trump/Harris policies have materially and adversely affected the lives of all of us, especially the lives of the less advantaged of us who rely on federal programs like SNAP, Medicaid and others.
And then to turn out voters next November to give Andy Harris the boot!