The GOP’s Shutdown Cruelty: Starving the Poor to Feed the Rich and Powerful

Millions lose food stamps, Trump gains millions from the DOJ, and Congress doesn’t even show up.

Video for Paid Subscribers at bottom.

In a few days, if this government shutdown continues, millions of Americans will stop receiving food stamps. That means mothers won’t be able to buy groceries. Veterans won’t be able to feed their families. Children will go hungry — not because of some natural disaster or accident of bureaucracy, but because our leaders made a deliberate choice.

And I know how this happens, because I’ve been in Congress. I’ve sat in those rooms where politicians calculate pain — where they decide that hurting ordinary Americans might be good for their “message.”

This president has a choice. He can use emergency funds to keep food assistance flowing while negotiations continue. He could say, “Not on my watch will people go hungry.” But he isn’t. He is choosing not to — because he wants the pain. He wants the headlines. He wants to point to struggling families and say, “Blame the Democrats.”

That’s not leadership. That’s sadism dressed up as politics.

Let’s be clear about what this says: The Republican Party knows that many working-class Americans — including those receiving food aid — still vote Republican. But they also know those voters aren’t their base anymore…at least not the base they cater to. The GOP base today is made up of the very wealthy, the donor class, and the politically connected. They’re the ones who get the tax breaks and the loopholes. They’re the ones who never lose a dime in a shutdown. The working man simply supplies the votes to help the rich…cloaked as protecting culture.

When the government stops, the poor lose food. The middle class loses paychecks. But the rich? They don’t lose anything. They call it a “market adjustment” and fly to Palm Beach.

Meanwhile, Donald Trump — the man who claims to be the champion of the “forgotten American” — is about to award himself $250 million from the Department of Justice to cover his own legal bills and “pain and suffering.” He’s spending $300 million on a ballroom at one of his properties. And somehow, in the middle of a funding crisis, DHS just bought Kristi Noem two brand-new jets worth $175 million.

That’s not America First — it’s Trump First, Always.

And Congress? Congress has taken the week off…again. No votes, no negotiations, no town halls. Just silence. They’ve shut down the government and then gone home, leaving the American people to pick up the pieces.

I can’t tell you how angry that makes me. I’ve seen what shutdowns do. I’ve seen families line up at food pantries because their pay got delayed. I’ve heard from single parents who rely on SNAP to get through the week. These are not “lazy” people. They’re workers — often working full-time — who still fall below the poverty line because the system rewards wealth, not work.

The stereotype of people on food stamps lounging on couches all day is a lie — a convenient one for politicians who need a scapegoat. The truth is that the majority of people on food assistance are working or disabled or elderly. They are people who love this country and just need a little help.

And that’s what government is supposed to do — protect its citizens in hard times. Not turn hunger into a political weapon.

When you see a president who intentionally withholds help to make a point, you’re seeing the moral rot that now defines the GOP. The cruelty isn’t a side effect — it’s the strategy.

We are watching the dismantling of empathy in real time.

I used to believe that Republicans cared about the country. But today’s GOP is led by people who would rather burn the government down than make it work for anyone who isn’t rich or powerful.

So as the food stops flowing and the lights stay dark in government offices, remember this: it didn’t have to be this way. The president could have acted. Congress could have shown up. But they didn’t — because in their political playbook, the suffering of ordinary people isn’t a crisis. It’s a feature.

And that’s not just bad policy. It’s moral bankruptcy.

Video for paid: