GOP bill could slash food aid that helps 1 in 6 Oregonians

Proposed cuts to the country’s largest food aid program could slash benefits currently going to one in six Oregonians or shift more than $1 billion in program costs to the state in each two-year budget cycle.

Republicans’

One, Big, Beautiful Bill Act

includes about $300 billion in cuts over 10 years to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP. The program, formerly known as food stamps, helps low-income individuals and households buy groceries and provides benefits to some 40 million people nationwide, including more than 750,000 in Oregon last year.

The bill

squeezed through the U.S. House of Representatives Thursday on a 215-214 vote and

now heads to the U.S. Senate, where Republican holdouts are promising major surgery. Democrats, meanwhile, are using the proposed SNAP cuts and reductions to Medicaid

as a cudgel against the bill, the Trump administration and their Republican colleagues.

U.S. Rep. Maxine Dexter, D-Oregon, held a news conference Friday at the Oregon Food Bank’s headquarters in Northeast Portland to drive home how the proposed cuts could affect Oregonians.

“Let me be clear. Hunger is not inevitable. It’s a heartless, immoral policy decision,” said Dexter,

the freshman lawmaker

whose district includes much of Portland. “And yesterday, House Republicans chose to literally rip food out of the mouths of our already struggling families to give tax breaks to billionaires.”

Oregon has one of the highest SNAP participation rates in the country, with approximately one in six residents and one quarter of all households receiving some level of benefits under the program.

The federal legislation proposes a major cost shift to states to cover both benefits and administrative expenses. The Oregon Department of Human Services estimates it would cost the state $843 million every two years to cover benefits the feds currently pay for, and another $170 million in administrative costs.

State officials also anticipate needing to spend another $140 million to backfill proposed federal cuts for emergency food assistance, summer food benefits for school-aged kids, and crisis response.

Barring the state’s ability to backfill those programs – a

forecast earlier this month

cut expected state revenues by about $755 million next biennium – food benefits would be slashed. As the legislation stands, state officials say the cuts would reduce average benefits by 21%, eliminating about $160 every month for a family of three – about a week’s worth of groceries.

The bill also expands existing work requirements for recipients to include parents with children over the age of six and adults age 55 to 64, while limiting waivers to those requirements for areas with poor economic conditions. It would also eliminate benefits for some immigrants.

Congresswoman Maxine Dexter, M.D. (OR-03) toured Oregon Food Bank Friday morning. She held a press conference discussing Republicans’ budget plan—which passed the House of Representatives Thursday —and would gut federal food assistance funding. May 23, 2025

Beth Nakamura

David Wieland, a policy advocate for the Partners for a Hunger-Free Oregon, said at Friday’s news conference that the cuts would fall hardest on children, as more than half of the program’s participants are in families with children. Participation in SNAP is also used to determine eligibility for preschool meals, summer food and childcare programs.

“When children lose access to SNAP, we know that the damage will be serious and generational in scope,” Wieland said. “Without enough food, long-lasting health and behavioral impacts follow. We can invest in Oregon’s children now, or we can pay a steep price later.”

Stricter work requirements have long been a priority for Republicans, who argue that beneficiaries lack incentive to pursue employment while receiving benefits. Proponents claim the stricter eligibility rules will provide that motivation, while eliminating fraud, waste and abuse in the system.

Most academic studies, however, suggest that more stringent requirement instituted previously have failed to boost employment, while shutting many needy recipients out of food aid.

The proposed cuts come as the state is seeing a record level of food insecurity amid inflation and the elimination of pandemic programs that provided a spectrum of benefits. Last year, the Oregon Food Bank’s network of 1,200 distribution sites around Oregon and southwest Washington saw 2.5 million visits, a 31% increase from the previous year.

Meanwhile, the Trump administration in January

halted $500 million in federal food aid

slated for distribution this year. That included 90 truckloads, or 4.2 million pounds of food, that would have been delivered to the Oregon Food Bank through the end of the year and distributed around the state. That $6 million hit represents about 18% of the food bank’s budget.

It’s unlikely that donors, suppliers or the Oregon Legislature will make that up, Andrea Williams, president of the organization, said Friday, pointing to empty supply bays around the warehouse. The result is emptier shelves at local food assistance sites and smaller allowances for families visiting them.

While the bill would cut federal food aid and other safety net programs, it would make President Trump’s 2017 tax cuts permanent and deliver new tax breaks for business owners, investors and homeowners in high-tax states. Bottom line, an analysis of the legislation by the

Congressional Budget Office

concludes that “resources would decrease for households in the lowest decile (tenth) of the income distribution, whereas resources would increase for those in the highest decile.”

Williams said the Oregon Food Bank has a simple message for senators: “You don’t have to do this. Go back to the drawing board. Do better. Do better for our kids. Do better for our parents. Do better for our seniors. Do better for every single person that’s going hungry in our state and in our nation.”

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Ted Sickinger

is a reporter on the investigations team. Reach him at 503-221-8505,

tsickinger@oregonian.com

or @tedsickinger