The House is expected to vote Thursday on a bill that would cut the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program by an almost unimaginable $40 billion over 10 years, kicking 3.8 million people out of the program in 2014.

Let's recap how we got here: Nutrition assistance is traditionally included in the farm bill, but this year, the House failed to pass its inclusive farm bill because "only" $2 billion a year in food stamp cuts were included and some tea party types wanted it to be more; meanwhile, many Democrats voted against the bill because of the magnitude of the food stamp cuts included in it. At Majority Leader Eric Cantor's urging, the House has split the farm bill into a farm-only bill and this bill taking nutrition assistance from 3.8 million people. House Republicans hope that by doing this they will—in addition to the posturing and useless statement-making they're so fond of—gain leverage in negotiations with the Senate over the final funding levels in the farm bill. They certainly know this bill with its $40 billion in cuts will never get through the Senate, and the Obama administration has issued a veto threat.

Republicans have all kinds of ridiculous logic on this:



"This bill not only restores the integrity of this safety-net program, it will help beneficiaries become more self-sufficient," a memo from House Republican Whip Rep. Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif. The memo contends that "middle class families struggling to make ends meet themselves foot the bill for a program that has gone well beyond a safety net for children, seniors, and the disabled."

Right. It's become a safety net for unemployed people in an economy with three jobseekers for every job , leaving two out of three unemployed people without any job prospects. It's become a safety net for people working low-wage jobs in a country where working full-time at the minimum wage leaves many in poverty and Republicans like McCarthy refuse to even hold a vote on raising the minimum wage.

How will taking food away from people make them magically "self-sufficient" when there are no jobs, or they have jobs that don't pay them enough to live on? The answer is it won't. It will make them go hungry. As Republicans well know, even if they pretend otherwise in their relentless quest to stigmatize and traumatize poor people.

Send an email your member of the House of Representatives opposing all cuts to food stamps.