The disastrous budget reconciliation package that is now in the Senate will severely harm at-risk communities unless substantial changes are made.
The $295 million in SNAP cuts will increase hunger across the country, hitting children, seniors, and working families the hardest. At a time when food insecurity is still high in many communities, cutting SNAP is both cruel and short-sighted.
Roughly 15 million Americans will lose health coverage because of the $800 billion cut to Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act along with other provisions in the House package.
Tens of millions of people with low incomes will lose access to basic needs programs, all to give tax breaks that primarily benefit the wealthy and corporations while inflicting harm on immigrant communities.
We cannot keep allowing the passage of these unfair tax policies that disproportionately benefit the rich while making low-income and vulnerable communities suffer, including by taking food assistance and health care away from millions. That’s not good for our society or economy.
Now more than ever, it’s critical that Congress protect health care, nutrition, and other essential services that help millions of families meet their basic needs. We should strengthen support for these programs—not take them away. We need each and every Senator to get a strong and clear message that their constituents oppose these harmful proposals.
From our friends at the YWCA:
We invite YWCAs and allied groups to focus their events and organizing on the myriad of racial justice issues that impact the health and safety of communities of color. Most importantly, we invite you to explore how From Declarations to Change: Addressing Racism as a Public Health Crisis can advance the work of justice in your community and empower people of color.
Structural racism plays a large role in determining the conditions in which people are born, grow, work, live, and age. These factors affect people’s access to quality housing, education, food, transportation, political power, and other social determinants of health. Understanding and addressing systemic racism from this public health perspective is crucial to eliminating racial and ethnic inequities, and to improving opportunity and well-being across communities.
Our collective efforts can root out injustice, transform institutions, and create a world that sees women, girls, and people of color the way we do: Equal. Powerful. Unstoppable.