Put Food Stamps on a Diet

By Christian Schneider

Thursday, July 17, 2025

 

Back in 2012, Donald Trump — real estate developer, future president, and amateur dietician — observed on Twitter that he had “never seen a thin person drinking Diet Coke.” A few days later, a perplexed Trump added, in a positively Lincolnian tone, “The more Diet Coke, Diet Pepsi, etc you drink, the more weight you gain?”

 

(In what became undoubtedly his most egregious episode of hypocrisy, Trump has had a button installed in the Oval Office to alert White House staffers to bring him what the kids are now calling “fridge cigarettes.”)

 

But let’s not pin our national waistband expansion on aspartame. What’s making Americans fat is food and drinks packed with sugar, carbohydrates, and high-fructose corn syrup (read: “food that is delicious”). And through the United States’ Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP), Americans are incentivized to buy more products that degrade our national health.

 

SNAP, a.k.a. food stamps, currently forbids splurges on booze, tobacco, deodorant, or the sandwich at KFC where the bun is actually two pieces of chicken. (It is called the “Double Down” sandwich, which prompts a certain type of joke, but I’ll spare you.)

 

But if you want to purchase a bag of Sour Patch Kids so hefty it requires a front-loader to get to your car? Totally fine. That loophole has 13 red-state legislatures yelling, “Enough!” Their request is simple: if we’re going to subsidize groceries, could we maybe not underwrite the glycemic apocalypse?

 

Over the past few months, the U.S. Department of Agriculture has granted six waivers to the SNAP program that will allow states to limit what welfare funds can be used to purchase, with seven more states moving forward with similar plans. This effort falls under Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s “Make America Healthy Again” initiative, and unlike some of Kennedy’s more dangerous ideas, especially his anti-vaccination positions, this one actually makes sense.

 

At present, roughly 25 percent of SNAP dollars buys candy and soft drinks. Program costs swelled from $63 billion in 2019 to $145 billion in 2023, with 42 million Americans — about 12 percent of the population — now swiping the distinctive EBT card.

 

As Ernie Hudson deadpans in the movie Ghostbusters, “That’s a big Twinkie.”

 

Images of the Great Depression taught us to picture the poor as gaunt figures in patched coats waiting for watery broth. Today, the harsh reality is inverted: many low-income Americans are overnourished in a way that undermines health, with high rates of hypertension, heart disease, and adult-onset diabetes.

 

Yes, correlation isn’t causation, but the parallels are hard to ignore. Cato Institute economist Chris Edwards points out that U.S. obesity has leapt from affecting 15 percent of the population in the late 1970s to over 42 percent today. A 2021 USDA study found that men enrolled in SNAP had higher obesity rates than low-income men who weren’t on the program (37 percent versus 32 percent). For women, the gap yawns wider: 52 percent versus 40 percent.

 

Of course, the makers of candy and soda spend millions lobbying to keep their products eligible for welfare funds. And so far, their money has been well spent, as few waivers were issued prior to 2025.

 

But here’s an iron law of economics: You get more of what you subsidize. When Washington foots the sugary bill, it shouldn’t gasp that the checkout lane looks like a trick-or-treat haul every day. Cutting soda from SNAP isn’t moral policing — it’s fiscal triage.

 

So it only makes sense to end the government’s role in declining health among lower-income American families, given how much more taxpayers are on the hook for the health problems caused by obesity on the back end (pun intended). Obesity-related illnesses are the single highest Medicaid expense, costing taxpayers $60 billion per year — money the debt-ridden government doesn’t have. A moment on the lips, a lifetime on the taxpayers’ hips.

 

Critics argue that consumption studies show that rich and poor guzzle sugary drinks at similar rates. Fine. Wealthy folks also splurge on artisan goat-yoga classes. That doesn’t mean taxpayers should bankroll Pilates for the Proletariat. SNAP exists to guarantee basic nutrition, not to replicate the snacks aisle of a minor-league baseball stadium. The word “nutrition” is right there in the acronym.

 

Politicians love to fight culture wars — and here’s a bipartisan skirmish with genuine upside. Congress should expand the USDA waiver authority nationwide. Require retailers to tweak their point-of-sale software — something they already do for age-restricted booze. And for the inevitable “government nanny” complainers: no one’s banning cola. Pay cash if you crave Dr Pepper; just don’t ask taxpayers to pay for your candy bar now and your Ozempic later.

 

Look, if conservatives can’t summon the courage to stop subsidizing Nerds-covered gummies, what hope is there for balancing a $35 trillion national debt? And if progressives truly care about public health, why keep funneling neon-colored syrup to communities already overwhelmed by diet-related illness?

 

For once, RFK Jr. is on the right path. Listen to him now and you might die of the measles, but at least you won’t catch it from a Three Musketeers bar.