HHS fires staff dedicated to helping low-income Americans pay for utilities: 'There's nobody left to do anything'

About 17% of U.S. households spend more than one-
tenth of their income on energy. (Adobe Stock photo)

A recent staffing purge of Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program employees at the Department of Health and Human Services may leave millions of low-income Americans unable to pay their utility bills. "The Trump administration abruptly laid off the entire staff running a $4.1 billion program to help low-income households across the United States pay their heating and cooling bills," reports Brad Plumer of The New York Times. The loss of assistance could burden millions of poorer rural residents who already spend a disproportionate amount of their incomes on energy bills when compared to their more urban counterparts.

It's unclear how a program that routinely helps roughly 6.1 million Americans can continue to offer assistance without any employees to administer payments. Mark Wolfe, executive director of the National Energy Assistance Directors Association, which works with states to secure funding from the program, told Plumer, “They fired everybody. There’s nobody left to do anything. Either this was incredibly sloppy, or they intend to kill the program altogether.”

While most of the 2025 funds have been paid, a remaining $378 million hangs in the balance. Plumer explains, "Congress had approved $4.1 billion for the program for fiscal year 2025, and about 90% of that money had already been sent to states in October to help households struggling with high heating costs." The $378 million could help lower-income residents pay for summer air-conditioning bills, but LIHEAP disbursements seem unlikely without program staffing.

The firings angered several Democratic lawmakers. Plumer reports, "Representative Jared Golden, a Democrat who represents a largely rural district in Maine that voted for President Trump, wrote in a social media post, 'What efficiency is achieved by firing everyone in Maine whose job is to help Mainers afford heating oil when it’s cold?'" Senator Edward Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat, referred to the LIHEAP staff eliminations as "sabotage."

A study published last year in The Economic Journal "found that roughly 17% of U.S. households spend more than one-tenth of their income on energy, a threshold that researchers often define as a 'severe' energy burden," Plumer adds. "The study also found a strong relationship between energy affordability and winter mortality."

USDA cuts hit schools, farmers and food banks. The lost funding and provisions hurt rural communities the most.

Food bank reductions are tough for rural communities
to replace. (Adobe Stock photo)

In an effort to bring U.S. Department of Agriculture spending back to pre-pandemic times, the USDA terminated more that $1 billion in food support programing. The cuts are likely to leave a path of hungry Americans in their wake.

In early March, the USDA cut more than $1 billion in funding for the Local Food for Schools Cooperative Agreement and the Local Food Purchase Assistance Cooperative Agreement programs for 2025. "The money was designed to pay farmers to provide food to schools and food banks," reports Jeanine Santucci of USA Today. "The abrupt cancellation of government funding for programs to help food banks distribute healthy, local food is being felt across the country, as some already strapped organizations turn to their local communities for help."

Both programs helped local growers boost their incomes while providing fresh food options to local schools and food banks. 

Food banks were dealt another blow when the USDA announced it was halting or reducing deliveries from part of its Emergency Food Assistance Program. Some of those reductions significantly scaled back food bank funding. Jackie DeFusco of NBC reports, "Feeding America, a nationwide network of food banks, food pantries and local meal programs, was recently informed that the USDA is canceling $500 million in federal funding as the administration reviews spending decisions made under the Biden administration."

The losses will be especially tough for rural communities to manage "because they depend the most on USDA-funded programs for the food distributed by food banks, said Vince Hall, chief government relations officer of the nonprofit Feeding America," Santucci explains.

According to Hall, the ways food banks receive donations also will contribute to rural regions struggling more than their urban counterparts to fill gaps in USDA funding and provisions. "They include donations from the community itself or from food producers, food purchased through the USDA programs and food purchased by the banks themselves with very limited resources," Santucci reports. "With the loss of a significant amount of federal funding for food purchases, they'll have to lean heavily on donations, which are harder to come by in spread-out, rural areas, he said."

Food inflation has made it difficult for many Americans to return to life without some type of assistance. Hall told Santucci, "Folks who came to us during the pandemic have found it impossible to ease out of dependency on food banks because inflation has made so many of their monthly budget essentials more expensive than ever."

GOP lawmakers consider snipping SNAP benefits to balance tax cuts. An expert explains SNAP.

The Conversation Chart, from USDA data

Congressional Republicans are eyeing substantial cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program; however, lopping off grocery dollars from the more than 41 million low-income Americans who rely on SNAP, which includes 1 in 5 children, could prove tricky and unpopular.

To explain what SNAP benefits are, and why some GOP lawmakers want to cut SNAP spending, The Conversation asked Tracy Roof, a political scientist who has researched government food programs, to explain, "What’s going on?" An edited version of their Q&A is shared below.

Why does it look like the federal government may cut SNAP spending?
"SNAP critics believe that the U.S. spends too much on the program, which cost the federal government $100 billion in the 2024 fiscal year. . . . Federal spending on SNAP, however, has been falling since it peaked at $119 billion in 2022. Some Republican lawmakers are calling for new changes that would cut spending on the program."

Is there a SNAP budget? How do people qualify for benefits?
No, there is no limit on what the federal government can spend on SNAP. However, persons applying for benefits must meet a complex set of eligibility criteria, which varies by state. "Americans can usually qualify for SNAP benefits if their income is under 130% of the federal poverty line. In 2025, that would be $41,795 for a family of four, and they have limited savings."

Does SNAP have work requirements? If so, what are they? Can unauthorized immigrants receive SNAP benefits?
"Most adults under the age of 60 are subject to work requirements if they are 'able-bodied' and not caring for a child or incapacitated adult. If adults between the ages of 18 and 54 don’t log at least 20 hours of work or another approved activity, their benefits can be cut off. Immigrants without authorization to reside in the U.S. aren’t eligible for SNAP."

How can the federal government try to cut SNAP spending?
There are two likely ways for lawmakers to trim SNAP costs.

"One is through the farm bill, a legislative package Congress typically renews every four or five years that sets policies for SNAP and programs that support farmers’ incomes. . . .The latest [Farm Bill] extension will expire on Sept. 30, 2025.

"The other option is through the so-called budget reconciliation process underway in Congress. Right now, the primary Republican plan calls for extending $4.5 trillion in tax cuts passed in the first Trump administration and making up to $2 trillion in spending cuts over the next decade."

How popular do you think these changes would be?
Cutting SNAP benefits at a time when food inflation and food insecurity are high is unlikely to be popular. "Polls show most Americans support increasing SNAP benefits, not cutting them. . . . Food banks, already struggling to meet demand and facing federal spending cuts, have warned they will not be able to fill gaps caused by reduced SNAP spending or new limits on benefits."

To read what changes or restrictions Republicans might seek to cut SNAP spending or to read more about the political obstacles to SNAP reductions, read the full Q&A here.

Debate: Is the American Farm Bureau Federation on the side of small farmers?

Journalists debate if the Farm Bureau
Federation is on the side of farmers.
(Photo by Ainur Khakimov, Unsplash)

Ambrook Research has a debate series where two journalists each write an article arguing a side of a topic. A recent debate focused on whether the American Farm Bureau Federation is on the side of small farmers.

Nolan Monaghan, a graduate of the University of Missouri’s Center for Agroforestry, and Deanna Fox, journalist and former CEO of New York Farm Bureau, offered differing views.

Monaghan's article is titled, “Is Farm Bureau a Friend to Small Farmers?” Fox's article is: “American Farm Bureau Is a Lesson in Democracy.”

Monaghan delved into the history of the organization and its purpose when it was created. He wrote that the bureau wanted to “distinguish itself” by “taking a less economically ambitious position” and that according to Stewart Truelsen, author of Forward Farm Bureau, “the federation sought ‘equality’ within agriculture.” However, Monaghan wrote that the equality was not between farmers but between agriculture and other industries.

Fox wrote that 86% of the farming operations in America are small family farms, which the six million members of the bureau help develop policy to advocate on behalf of them. After explaining the start of the Farm Bureau Federation, Fox wrote, “One thing that has not changed is the grassroots policy development that defines the Bureau’s commitment to family farms.”

Monaghan argued that over time the bureau’s goals have shifted to be more business-focused instead of helping small farmers. “Instead of managing overproduction, the strategy of this era was to shove every calorie of output into any market the government could create on behalf of farmers.”

Eventually this came to hurt small farms, “Oversupply reared its ugly head, leading to millions of farm family balance sheets to tilt to the red. Rural banks and small businesses began closing as farms went bankrupt,” Monaghan wrote.

However, Fox said the farm bureau is actively trying to support farmers. “The respect of differing viewpoints is honored, and a commitment to providing sustenance for all Americans is the unifying thread.” Fox also wrote that, “diverse opinions have led to positions that address a range of environmental, climate, and social justice issues.”

U.S. farmers already had big worries. New tariffs, USDA cuts and funding freezes have hit them 'on all fronts.'

U.S. soybean farmers have yet to regain market share
with China after Trump's first-term tariffs. (A.S. photo)

 

U.S. farmers are getting squeezed from all sides by U.S. tariffs, crackdowns on undocumented workers and changes at the Department of Agriculture. Many of the new administration's policies have put farmers' livelihoods on the chopping block. Some farmers admit the pressure cooker of change and uncertain financial outlook is pushing them to reconsider their support for President Trump's policies and the actions of his appointed officials.

Before the new administration began making dramatic policy changes and cuts, farmers were "already struggling with low prices, high expenses and unpredictable — and at times, destructive— weather," reports Kristina Peterson of The Wall Street Journal. "But now, farmers — traditionally a key block of support for Trump — are also contending with USDA and foreign-aid funding that is frozen or in limbo," plus deportations "in an already tight agricultural-labor market" and the possibility of "another crippling trade war."

Jim Hartman is a military veteran turned North Carolina honey bee farmer who has already lost roughly $100,000 in expected farm revenue from USDA program cuts. The lifelong Republican voter told Peterson, “Stuff like this is pushing me left."

Caleb Ragland, president of the American Soybean Association and a soy farmer in Magnolia, Ky., told Peterson, "“It’s hitting us on all fronts. You’re talking about the potential of a flat-out crisis in rural America and the farm economy.”

A recent AgWeb poll shows that a majority of farmers do not approve of Trump's current use of tariffs. "Just over half of farmers, 54%, said they didn’t support Trump’s use of tariffs as a negotiating tool, according to a poll of nearly 3,000 farmers," Peterson reports. "Farmers accustomed to dealing with uncertainty from the weather and the markets said the federal government, which spends tens of billions of dollars to support them each year, is usually a force helping them offset that instability."

Trump's enthusiasm for using and increasing tariffs "has many in rural America nervous," Peterson writes. "Trump’s first trade war led to more than $27 billion in losses of agricultural export. In response, China started importing more soybeans from Brazil, and U.S. soybean farmers have yet to regain their market share."

Hartman believes USDA changes will cut his yearly predicted revenue in half. He told Peterson, "This has fallen on the backs of small farmers. . . . The people Trump's appointed and the way they’re going about things, it’s not OK."

Opinion: Bringing women's leadership back onto the farm could benefit the country

Malia Reisinger runs her family's farm and her house-
hold like generations of rural women before her.

For hundreds of years, American women ran or helped run family farms. The fact that they were female meant little to families who had to rely on every working hand to manage farm animals and crops. As the United States began urbanizing, women were removed from farming leadership, so much so that their decades of farming experience have been largely forgotten.

Book author and public relations consultant Brian Reisinger shares his sister's experience and why he believes revitalizing female leadership on U.S. farms could help bridge rural-urban divides while providing a more secure future for American family farms.

"My sister, Malia, was a skilled welder. . .one of the many trades a farmer picks up, to get [machinery] going again when break­downs halted work on the farm. So, when she needed a part that required going to town, she went in herself," Reisinger explains. "But when she asked a guy for help, she got a response my dad or I never would have: 'Shouldn’t a man be getting it?'"

Quips like that were "one of the countless moments Malia faced being a woman in the 'man’s world' of farming," Reisinger writes. "It was far from the only time she confronted this challenge, despite the independent women she’d grown up working alongside. Rarely, did she encounter openly hostile sexism; more often it was small indignities that piled up over time."

Rural women led social changes for
decades. (Boston Public Library photo)

For some readers, rural life and women's rights may seem at odds, but "American farming once boasted nearly 6.8 million farms, nearly all of them small operations often ran by women as much as their husbands in many ways," Reisinger writes. "For much of our history, rural women led the charge on social progress through many of our country’s biggest crises." 

The place of women as farm workers and as social leaders is marked throughout U.S. history:

• 6.8 million: Farms at America’s height in 1935, mostly small family operations where women did the work of men
• 11.8 million: Men who went off to WWII, leaving behind urban jobs rural women were ready to fill. 
• By the time of World War II, as more than 12.2 million Americans went to war, there was a legion of rural women moving to the city and handling the industrial jobs of the men.
  

Watching and learning from female farm leadership "can challenge us to change. But if we can force ourselves to stop getting rural voters — and each other — so wrong, we can craft new policies to help solve these problems," Reisinger adds. "There’s reason to believe we can do this. We still have nearly 2 million farms in this country, 96% of which are family operations. That’s nearly 2 million families, searching for a way to survive, led by people like my sister who our policymakers could do so much more to understand. . . "

 

Read Reisinger's full opinion here.

Jeremy Gulban is serious about saving local newspapers. 'It’s kind of crazy,' but he's trying to find a way.

Jeremy Gulban

Jeremy Gulban is a man on a mission to save at least 92 community newspapers from shuttering their doors. While he's out in the trenches facing tariffs, polarized audiences and stiff competition, "Gulban is discovering in ways large and small just how hard it is to revive America’s ailing local news outlets," reports Katherine Sayre of The Wall Street Journal. "Americans are increasingly distrustful of print media, podcasts are ascendant as go-to news sources and even finding human reporters to hire has proven tough."

Over the past five years, Gulban has purchased dozens of small newspapers through his company, CherryRoad Media. "Today, the top 30 or so of Gulban’s newspapers are profitable, about 30 post mediocre results and about 30 are losing money. The company had $30 million in revenue last year and wasn’t profitable overall," Sayre writes. "Gulban needs between 15% and 20% of households in his communities to subscribe to be economically viable. . . . Across the company, about 8% of households subscribe now, but that ranges from 2% to 69%, depending on the paper."

Gulban began his foray into print news because he felt "that big tech companies like Meta Platforms and Alphabet’s Google had too much control over the flow of information and commerce for local businesses," Sayre explains. Gulban told her, "If we made the rational business decision, we would take our best-performing markets, say that’s what we’re going with. But that’s not what I want to do. I want to figure out how to make this work.”

Part of Gulban's plan was to hire dedicated reporters who interact with their community. "In some markets, Gulban can’t find reporters willing to do the job," Sayre adds. "The company searched for two years for a full-time reporter at its Crookston Daily Times in Minnesota, offering a salary of $40,000. The newspaper was shuttered in February."

Some people in small towns have reached out directly to Gulban for help. "Kitty Mayo and other residents in the area of Two Harbors, Minn., lobbied Gulban to start a newspaper there after the Lake County News-Chronicle closed in 2020," Sayre reports. "Gulban agreed. The Lake County Press launched in 2022. Mayo said she asked an editor at another CherryRoad newspaper about Gulban before she contacted him. The editor told her: 'This guy, he’s legit. He wants to save small newspapers. It’s kind of crazy. I don’t know if he can do it.'"

USDA cuts and freezes 'ripple' through rural communities, leaving farmers and states scrambling to manage losses

USDA cuts 'are being keenly felt' in Appalachia.
(Adobe Stock photo)

U.S. Department of Agriculture funding cuts and freezes have left farmers and states struggling with supply issues, financial losses and budget shortages. "Along the winding back roads and Appalachian hollers of West Virginia, in a state where Trump won 70% of the votes cast, his administration's vow to cut back on government spending is being keenly felt," reports P.J. Huffstutter of Reuters. Some states may be forced to shutter programs because there isn't enough money to cover gaping budget shortfalls.

In one of its first major cuts, the USDA canceled the "Local Food Purchase Assistance Cooperative Agreement Program, which was due to provide about $500 million this year to food banks," Huffstutter explains. "Trump's administration also rolled out cuts to other federal funding that has kept small agriculture businesses open."

For decades, Washington has used "an intricate web of economic support. . . to pump money into rural America," Huffstutter writes. "Much of it has now been frozen, cut back or eliminated – including at least $1.5 billion in USDA funds for schools and food banks."

To help contain the damage, states are "forced to come up with funding from their own budgets – or shutter programs altogether," Huffstutter adds. "States like West Virginia – where more than half the $19.2 billion annual budget for fiscal 2025 relies on federal funds – are particularly hard-hit. . . . Federal funds on average comprise about one-third of states' annual spending."

Meanwhile, some farmers have excess production that was planned for a Local Food for Schools contract. Kentucky farmer Andre Faul's 1,300-pound problem serves as an example. "His farm had a contract with Oldham County Schools to provide chicken and pork for school lunches," reports Beth Musgrave of the Lexington Herald-Leader. "But Faul and 130 Kentucky farmers who were paid through a federal program were notified the USDA nixed the grant. . . . How was Faul going to pay for the 1,300 pounds of chicken Oldham County had already ordered and he had already paid for and fed?"

Madison Pergrem, a spokeswoman for the Kentucky Department of Agriculture, told Musgrave, "The LFPA program has significantly supported Kentucky agriculture and delivered fresh, local products to our communities in need. . . .KDA will actively pursue and develop new opportunities to advance these efforts.”

Musgrave adds, "Kentucky food programs were started to help local food production and expand markets for smaller growers."

The physical presence of modern technology encroaches over farmland and behind homes

Power lines for Virginia data center may reach across 
Maryland farmland. (Photo by Gary Meulemans, Unsplash)

As the desire for "more" pushes technology to grow and advance, so does the need for electricity to supply its physical growth.

Institutions and businesses used to have their own data centers, but in the past 15 years they began using third parties to house them and warehouses (or computer hotels) followed in quick succession, said Jon Hukill, spokesperson for the Data Center Coalition, according to Stephanie Hanes.

Hanes explored the impact that data centers and their electricity needs are having on communities and farmers in Maryland and Virginia, in an article for The Christian Science Monitor. These data centers are now bumping up to residential areas and the power lines to supply them are proposed to come from New Jersey, through Maryland farms, to the centers in Virginia.

“The industrial scale of data centers makes them largely incompatible with residential uses… And industry trends make future residential impacts more likely,” said Mark Gribbin, chief legislative analyst for Virginia’s Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission. Hanes said Gribbin's research found that a third of data centers were now located near homes.

The concerns of the residents affected vary, but they are worrying. Brent Hunsinger, a local river steward, expressed his fears to Hanes, “With data centers, the effects are more distributed…There’s water; there’s the electricity demand, also the transmission lines.” 

U.S. Supreme Court looks poised to allow $8 billion for rural and low-income broadband and phone services

The Supreme Court building in Washington, D.C.
(Adobe Stock photo)

The U.S. Supreme Court seems likely to approve continued funding for an $8 billion program for broadband and phone service maintenance and expansion in rural and poor parts of the U.S., reports Mark Sherman of The Associated Press. In what is considered a "new test of federal regulatory power," justices are "reviewing an appellate ruling that struck down as unconstitutional the Universal Service Fund, the tax that has been added to phone bills for nearly 30 years."

John Fritze of CNN reports, "A conservative 'consumer awareness group' challenged [USF] as an unconstitutional 'delegation' of the power of Congress to levy taxes. What’s worse, the group argues, a private entity calculates the amount of money that must be contributed. . . . .The Supreme Court has not invoked the non-delegation doctrine – or the idea that Congress cannot delegate its authority – since the 1930s. It has, for decades, permitted delegations under certain conditions."

The court seem sympathetic to communities that receive USF dollars. Sherman reports, "Liberal and conservative justices alike said they were concerned about the potentially devastating consequences of eliminating the fund that has benefited tens of millions of Americans."

Should the conservative-led court uphold USF funding, the ruling will be a departure from its ongoing efforts to "rein in" federal agencies, Sherman writes. "The Trump administration, which has moved aggressively to curtail administrative agencies in other areas, is defending the FCC program."

Consumer Research calls USF "a 'nightmare scenario' in which Congress has set no limits on how much the FCC can raise to fund the program," Sherman reports. “'Predictably, the USF tax rate has skyrocketed. It was under 4% in 1998 but now approaches 37%,' lawyers for the group wrote."

Congress established the Universal Service Fund in 1996. Fritze explains, "Telecommunications companies contribute billions to that fund – a cost that is passed on to consumers – to pay for programs like E-Rate, which lowers the cost of high-speed internet for libraries and schools."

The court's decision is expected in June.

Rural letter carriers rally against USPS privatization; about 51.3 million rural Americans could be impacted

More than 100 rural letter carriers gathered to rally
against USPS privatization. (The Daily Yonder photo)

Rural letter carriers from around the country gathered last week at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. to "rally in support of the U.S. Postal Service, which they said faces an increasing threat of privatization under President Donald Trump," reports Julia Tilton for The Daily Yonder. "The rally was attended by members of Congress from both sides of the aisle."

The event also announced the "launch of the NRLCA’s National Campaign to Protect the U.S. Postal Service from Privatization, which the union said is its top priority to preserve what it calls a 'critical institution that serves rural America and the country at large,'" Tilton writes. "Approximately 51.3 million rural addresses would be disproportionately impacted by the privatization of the USPS, according to NRLCA National President Don Maston."

Part of the USPS service mandate is to get mail and packages across the "last miles," which can add to delivery expenses. Tilton explains, "It is unprofitable for private companies to deliver mail to the end of long dirt roads located 50 or 100 miles from the nearest post office, Maston said. Privatization would add surcharges to such rural deliveries, which include essential goods like prescription medications and documents like Social Security checks and ballots."

Maston told the Yonder: “Rural Americans rely on rural carriers. In fact, the entire community relies on the rural carrier, and that sense of community would be taken away, and the disproportionately impacted group in the Postal Service would be rural carriers, rural Americans, and rural communities.”

Rally speakers "called for bipartisan support for House Resolution 70, a resolution in the House of Representatives that affirms the Postal Service’s role as a federal institution and opposes privatization," Tilton adds. "Since being introduced at the end of January, the resolution has garnered 180 cosponsors. . . . After the rally, more than 100 rural postal workers headed to meetings with members of Congress to ask for their support in backing the USPS."

As the battle over water fluoridation continues, rural Americans are at risk for higher rates of tooth decay

Thirteen states and the counties in gray don't report data on fluoride and drinking water to CDC.
(Map by Brett Kelman, Harvard University study from Census and CDC data)

As states consider banning tap water fluoridation mandates, rural America may be at risk for higher rates of tooth decay and its accompanying health problems. "Dozens of communities have decided to stop fluoridating in recent months, and state officials in Florida and Texas have urged their water systems to do the same," reports Brett Kelman of KFF Health News. "Utah is poised to become the first state to ban it in tap water."

Advocates for banning water fluoridation often cite "a government report last summer that found a possible link between lower IQ in children and consuming amounts of fluoride that are higher than what is recommended in American drinking water," Kelman explains. "The report was based on an analysis of 74 studies conducted in other countries, most of which were considered 'low quality' and involved exposure of at least 1.5 milligrams of fluoride per liter of water — or more than twice the U.S. recommendation."

Even as the battle over fluoridation continues, rural Americans already struggle to access basic dental care. Kelman reports, "Republican efforts to extend tax cuts and shrink federal spending may squeeze Medicaid, which could deepen existing shortages of dentists in rural areas where many residents depend on the federal insurance program for whatever dental care they can find."

Removing fluoride from rural water sources could exacerbate dental decay and the numerous other health problems it causes. "Dental experts warn that the simultaneous erosion of Medicaid and fluoridation could exacerbate a crisis of rural oral health," Kelman writes. "The changes could reverse decades of progress against tooth decay, particularly for children and those who rarely see a dentist."

Rural America already has large pockets with few dentists and unfluoridated water. A Harvard study "identified over 780 counties where more than half of the residents live in a [dentist] shortage area. Of those counties, at least 230 also have mostly or completely unfluoridated public drinking water," Kellman explains. "That means people in these areas who can’t find a dentist also do not get protection for their teeth from their tap water."

Several peer-reviewed studies give a glimpse into what ending water fluoridation could look like. Kelman writes, "Studies of cities in Alaska and Canada have shown that communities that stopped fluoridation saw significant increases in children’s cavities when compared with similar cities that did not."

Many Americans favor fluoridation, but "a sizable minority does not," Kelman notes. "Polls from Axios/Ipsos and AP-NORC found that 48% and 40% of respondents wanted to keep fluoride in public water supplies, while 29% and 26% supported its removal."