Last Chance to Save SNAP - Tell your Representatives to use the Congressional Review Act
Note: only one of the following two Congresswomen represents you. To find out which one, click here.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi
SF Office: (415) 556-4862
DC Office: (202) 225-4965
Call the SF office first, but try the DC office if you can’t get through. If you get voicemail, hang up and try a few more times to talk to a real person. Don’t give up! Short direct messages are most effective. Hate the phone? Resistbot is your friend.
Rep. Jackie Speier
San Mateo Office: (650) 342-0300
DC Office: (202) 225-3531
Keep calling if you don’t get through. Voicemails are logged daily into a central report across offices. Hate the phone? Resistbot is your friend.
Call Script
My name is __________. I am a constituent, and my zip code is _______. I am a member of Indivisible SF.
Last week, the Trump administration finalized a USDA rule change that will kick nearly 700,000 people off of SNAP. Two additional rules changes, that will increase that number to 3.7 million people, are pending and will be finalized soon.
I insist that my representative use the powers of the Congressional Review Act to block these draconian new rule changes, otherwise due to go into effect in April 2020. The GOP made extensive use of the CRA to block numerous Obama-era regulatory rule changes. It's high time Democrats do the same!
Background
Late last year, the Trump administration finalized a USDA rule change that will kick nearly 700,000 people off of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), commonly known as food stamps. Two additional rules changes, that will increase that number to 3.7 million people, are pending and will be finalized soon.
The initial Trump rule targets able-bodied adults, without children, who are already living below the poverty line. Most of the people in this group are ineligible for any other form of government financial assistance, because they aren't elderly, severely disabled, or raising minor children. They're just poor. The Trump administration is taking away the only assistance they can receive, to help them make ends meet. The Trump administration estimates that by taking food benefits away from struggling adults, it will save hardworking taxpayers $15 billion over ten years. To put this in context, this is nearly equivalent to the $12 billion the Trump administration is planning to gift - this year alone - to large corporate agri-businesses (including the one owned by GOP Iowa Senator, Chuck Grassley) as compensation for the massive economic damage done by Trump's ill-fated China trade tariffs.
In light of all this, please call your representatives today and insist that they use the powers of the CRA to block these cruel and unjust rule changes to SNAP.
What is the Congressional Review Act?
The Congressional Review Act (CRA) is a law that was enacted by the United States Congress under House Speaker Newt Gingrich as Subtitle E of the Contract with America Advancement Act of 1996 (Pub.L. 104–121) and signed into law by President Bill Clinton on March 29, 1996. The law empowers Congress to review, by means of an expedited legislative process, new federal regulations issued by government agencies and, by passage of a joint resolution, to overrule a regulation.
Once a rule is thus repealed, the CRA also prohibits the reissuing of the rule in substantially the same form or the issuing of a new rule that is substantially the same "unless the reissued or new rule is specifically authorized by a law enacted after the date of the joint resolution disapproving the original rule" (5 U.S. Code § 801(b)(2)). Congress has a window of 60 legislative days (i.e., days that Congress is actually in session, rather than simple calendar days) to disapprove of any given rule by simple majority vote; otherwise, the rule will go into effect at the end of that period.
Prior to 2017, the CRA had been successfully invoked only once, to overturn a rule in 2001. In January 2017, however, with a new Republican president (Donald Trump), the Republican-controlled 115th Congress began passing a series of disapproval resolutions to overturn a variety of rules issued under the Obama administration. Ultimately, fourteen such resolutions repealing Obama administration rules were passed and signed into law; a fifteenth resolution was passed by the House but failed in the Senate.
Because of the shortness of legislative sessions during the 114th Congress, the 115th Congress was able to target rules issued by the Obama administration as far back as May 2016. In late 2017 and early 2018, Congress passed two resolutions repealing Consumer Financial Protection Bureau rules made by former President Obama's CFPB Director, Richard Cordray, who didn't leave his post until late 2017.