USDA Flyer: We Don't Check Immigration Status for Food Stamps

A government watchdog group has discovered that the United States government is advising Spanish-speaking residents that they need not declare their immigration status to qualify for food stamps.

Judicial Watch obtained the Spanish-language flyers through a Freedom of Information Act request and announced on Thursday that the “promotion of the food stamp program, now known as ‘SNAP’ (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program), includes a Spanish-language flyer provided to the Mexican Embassy by the USDA. 

A statement on the flyer–emphasized in bold and underlined–reads, “You need not divulge information regarding your immigration status in seeking this benefit for your children.”

Judicial Watch president Tom Fitton said of this discovery, the “USDA is actively working with the Mexican government to promote food stamps for illegal aliens.” This implication, he asserted, “should have a direct impact on the fate of the immigration bill now being debated in Congress.”

“These disclosures further confirm the fact that the Obama administration cannot be trusted to protect our borders or enforce our immigration laws,” Fitton said. “And the coordination with a foreign government to attack the policies of an American state is contemptible.”

Sen. John Thune (R-SD) and Rep. Marlin Stutzman (R-IN) are working on a bill that would cut such programs. 

“Since President Obama came into office, SNAP participation has increased at 10 times the rate of job creation, the annual spending on SNAP has doubled, and one in seven Americans now participates in SNAP,” Thune said. “This explosive growth in both the SNAP enrollment and federal cost of the program is alarming and requires lawmakers to take cost-effective legislative control measures.”

Photo: USDA via Thinkstock