Oklahoma Tells Low-Income Kids to Go Hungry

Oklahoma, one of the worst states in the country for child hunger, has rejected a federal program that would have provided food for low-income children over the summer.

The summer EBT benefits program launched nationwide in 2023, after being pilot-tested for a few years. Under the program, eligible families would have received $40 per eligible child, per month, in the form of a pre-loaded card that can be used to buy groceries. The benefits work in conjunction with other food aid programs such as SNAP and WIC.

The deadline for states to indicate they intended to opt in to the program was on January 1. Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt’s office said they were concerned that states had to opt in before the exact rules of the program had been finalized. Stitt’s office also said that the program could incur new administrative costs. (All of the benefits are funded by the federal program, and states simply have to pay half the cost to run the actual program.)

But gubernatorial spokeswoman Abegail Cave argued that the summer EBT program was unnecessary. “Oklahoma already has multiple programs to serve food-insecure children across Oklahoma,” she said.

Chris Bernard, the president and CEO of Hunger Free Oklahoma, pointed out that about 20 percent of children in Oklahoma currently experience food insecurity, while about 60 percent rely on free or reduced-price school lunches.

“We’re one of the worst in the nation, and that’s been true for a while now,” Bernard said. “Parents are going to skip meals, or you’re going to stretch meals farther. The charitable side will try and fill that gap. But there are going to be some struggles.”

Although Oklahoma has rejected the summer program, the Cherokee and Chickasaw Nations, both of which are located in the Sooner State, are opting in. The Cherokee Nation joined the program when it was still in its pilot stage, and leaders reported helping feed 7,000 children in the summer of 2023.

“I wish Oklahoma was participating. It’s frankly mystifying as to why they’re not participating for a relatively small administrative cost, bringing federal tax dollars back home in the form of a benefit for low-income families. That’s, to me, as much of a no brainer as you could get. I’m baffled as to why the state of Oklahoma is not participating,” said Cherokee Nation Principal Chief Chuck Hoskin Jr.

It’s not just Oklahoma: A total of just 39 states, territories, and tribal nations have indicated they plan to join the program this summer, according to the U.S. Food and Nutrition Service.

This, unfortunately, follows a larger trend of politicians apparently wanting kids to go hungry. In June, the Republican Study Committee released a proposed budget for 2024. One of the party’s professed priorities is to eliminate the Community Eligibility Provision, or CEP, from the School Lunch Program, because “CEP allows certain schools to provide free school lunches regardless of the individual eligibility of each student.”

Texas Representative Troy Nehls showed his true colors on Wednesday, refusing to back any sort of border deal because he claimed it could help President Joe Biden’s slumping poll numbers.

“Let me tell you, I’m not willing to do too damn much right now to help a Democrat and to help Joe Biden’s approval rating,” the MAGA Republican told CNN.

“I will not help the Democrats try to improve this man’s dismal approval ratings. I’m not going to do it. Why would I? Chuck Schumer has had H.R. 2 on his desk since July. And he did nothing with it,” Nehls added.

Republican loyalty to H.R. 2, an asylum-limiting immigration bill that passed in the House with zero Democratic votes, has proven to be an unstoppable headache for Congress with an almost zero percent chance of passing in the Democratic-controlled Senate or being signed by the president.

That hasn’t stopped House Republicans, more than 60 of whom traveled to the U.S.-Mexico border on Wednesday, from rejecting any sort of bipartisan deal on border security.

And Nehl’s confession on Wednesday may hint at the reason why: Republicans care more about who sits in the White House than doing anything about the border situation they keep harping on about.

“When the House clings to H.R. 2 as the only solution … we’re not going to get a deal,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said on Wednesday. “We’re willing to meet the Republicans a good part of the way. I think now in the last few days, many Republicans have begun to realize that we are willing to do that and how serious we are about getting this done.”

The transparently vacuous approach to building a border wall is not an uncommon party trick for conservatives, who have been so inoperative on their self-proclaimed party objectives in recent years that their own caucus has taken to railing against them on the House floor.

In November, Representative Chip Roy laid into his party for failing to pass any laws or reach meaningful policy goals that could translate to campaign talking points, leveraging years of inaction at the border under Trump’s presidency as his primary example.

“One thing. I want my Republican colleagues to give me one thing. One. That I can go campaign on and say we did,” Roy said. “One!”

“With all due respect to former President Trump, they sure as hell didn’t get border security done when we had the White House and the House and the Senate,” Roy said. “Talked a big game about building a wall and having Mexico pay for it. Ain’t no wall, and Mexico didn’t pay for it, and we didn’t pass any border security.”

Donald Trump has lost another battle with E. Jean Carroll, and he’s handling it in a classic fashion: by completely flying off the handle.

Over the span of about 30 minutes Thursday morning, Trump made 31 posts about Carroll on Truth Social. Although he didn’t say anything himself, he shared stories from conservative outlets attacking her and comments from internet users calling her “creepy.” He also shared media interview clips and social media posts that appear to come from Carroll, all stripped of context so as to paint her as some sort of sexual deviant.

Trump’s gross little rampage is likely the result of a Wednesday court ruling rejecting his latest attempt to delay his upcoming trial for defaming Carroll. The trial is due to start on January 15.

In May, a jury unanimously found Trump liable for sexual abuse and battery against Carroll in the mid-1990s and for defaming her in 2022 while denying the assault. He was ordered to pay her $5 million in damages.

The upcoming trial is for comments Trump made in 2019, when he said Carroll made up the rape allegation to promote her memoir. Presiding Judge Lewis Kaplan ruled that since Trump has already been found liable for sexual abuse, his 2019 comments are by default defamatory. Carroll is now seeking up to $12 million in damages.

Trump has tried to argue that he has presidential immunity from the second defamation lawsuit, which Kaplan has repeatedly rejected. A main reason behind Kaplan’s decision is the fact that Trump waited three years before bringing up his immunity defense, and then another seven months before he actually moved to use that defense.

Trump appealed Kaplan’s ruling to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, which ruled against him in mid-December. The three-judge panel also determined that Trump had waived his right to claim immunity by waiting for so long to bring up the potential defense.

Trump filed a motion for the entire array of the appeals court’s judges to rehear his case. The Second Circuit denied his request Wednesday, without explanation, per standard procedure. This is likely what sent Trump over the edge.

And now, thanks to his creepy Truth Social posts, Trump may have handed Carroll another chance to take him to court. Allison Gill, a former Veterans Affairs official and host of the podcast Mueller, She Wrote, pointed out that Carroll could ask for an injunction to stop Trump from continuing to make potentially defamatory statements about her.

“If an injunction is violated, jail is a remedy, as are additional fines,” Gill wrote on X (formerly Twitter).

A new survey suggests that an increasing number of Republicans view Donald Trump as a person of faith, with Trump earning higher ratings than even some of the more vocally religious members of the Grand Old Party, including former Vice President Mike Pence and Senator Mitt Romney.

Despite Trump’s sin-filled legal tribulations, 64 percent of Republicans reported that they viewed him as a person of faith, according to a new poll conducted by HarrisX for Deseret News in November, up from 53 percent in a similar poll conducted in October.

The poll was conducted among 1,012 registered voters between November 21 and 22, 2023, with a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.

Trump ranked head and shoulders above his competitors in the upcoming GOP primary. Trump’s primary rival, former South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley, who converted from Sikhism to Christianity was viewed as a person of faith by 44 percent of surveyed Republicans, leaving Florida Governor Ron DeSantis once again with the short end of the stick—just 34 percent of Republicans saw the onetime potential Trump usurper as a person of faith.

Trump also topped Pence, one of the most vocal Christian evangelists in U.S. politics, by a margin of 8 percent. Even Romney couldn’t compete, with just 34 percent of Republicans viewing him as a person of faith.

However, Trump’s ranking as a person of faith differs from how Republicans view his religiosity, and that’s where Pence and Trump trade places. Sixty-two percent of Republicans said they viewed Pence as religious versus 47 percent who said the same for Trump.

Meanwhile, President Joe Biden, who attends mass every week, per his White House schedule, was only branded as a person of faith by 13 percent of Republicans—though slightly more, 26 percent, conceded that he was religious.

When prompted to explain why they felt Trump was a person of faith, few respondents pointed toward the former president’s actual religious practices. Sixty-seven percent of surveyed respondents replied that it was instead because they viewed him as someone who defends people of faith in the United States. More than half (54 percent) said that they viewed him that way because he “cares about people like me.”

People who described Biden as a person of faith, on the other hand, said so in part due to perceptions of his character, describing the president as honest and trustworthy (48 percent), ethical (47 percent), and having a strong moral compass (52 percent).

A group in Arkansas is working to get abortion protections on the state’s 2024 ballot. But experts warn that the measure would actually open the door to more government intervention in reproductive access.

The fight for abortion access is increasingly playing out through ballot measures, which have led to multiple wins even in otherwise deep-red states. But should the Arkansas ballot succeed, it would actually provide fewer protections than Roe v. Wade did, according to a Wednesday report by Slate.

The proposal—which is still awaiting a decision from the state’s attorney general—comes from a ballot committee called Arkansans for Limited Government, or AFLG, which was founded by the democracy nonprofit For AR People. The measure would only codify abortion through 18 weeks of pregnancy, far short of the generally accepted 24-week mark for viability (when a fetus can survive outside the uterus). Roe had allowed abortion up to 24 weeks.

Arkansas currently bans all abortion, with only narrow exceptions to save the life of the pregnant person. Democratic attempts to pass laws expanding abortion access have failed. AR People’s executive director, Gennie Diaz, told Slate her group created a ballot measure they believe both sides can ultimately accept as a more moderate approach.

Even though the measure clearly allows the state to continue banning abortion, just at a later point, Diaz argued the measure is “threading the needle with Arkansas voters on what they view as limited government.”

“It’s not meant to be a parlor trick,” she said, arguing that adding some restrictions would appeal to people who consider themselves “pro-life.” “Honestly, it’s not palatable to either end of the spectrum, and that’s intentional.”

But if the ballot measure was drafted with anti-abortion voters in mind, it doesn’t seem to have worked. The group Arkansas Right to Life is already slamming the measure as allowing “abortions up to the moment of birth.” Of course, that’s completely inaccurate on two counts. First, abortions do not occur up to the moment of birth. Second, a pregnancy lasts 40 weeks, whereas the measure bans abortion after only 18. Still, it’s a sign of what anti-abortion Arkansans really think of the measure.

AFLG, meanwhile, is not affiliated with Planned Parenthood, nor is it publicly supported by any abortion providers or ob-gyns. Diaz said they consulted reproductive health experts on the ballot measure, but abortion rights experts say the initiative could do more harm than good.

Erika Christensen of the group Patient Forward, which supports broad abortion protections, said limiting abortion to a specific point is “willfully ignorant.” She pointed out that a pregnancy can turn fatal for either the fetus or the patient at any point. What’s more, abortion restrictions of any kind stigmatize the procedure and allow the state to monitor and even criminalize pregnancy outcomes. And as with all abortion limitations, the “most under-resourced and over-policed” people, such as women of color, will be hit hardest.

There is also rapidly growing evidence that complete abortion access might actually stand a chance on the Arkansas ballot. Since Roe was overturned, multiple Republican-led states have put the question of abortion on the ballot—and every single time, voters choose to dramatically increase protections. Trying to roll back the 24-week abortion standard could set a dangerous precedent for other red states.

Tresa Undem, who co-founded the nonpartisan polling firm PerryUndem, has followed abortion opinions for two decades. She warned that even though AFLG said its ballot measure language had polling support, it’s possible the questions asked didn’t capture the whole picture.

What’s more, Undem conducted a national poll over the summer to see if voters were more likely to support a ballot initiative proposal that mentioned viability versus one that didn’t. She found voters preferred complete, expansive access by 15 points.

“I was kind of blown away, frankly,” she told Slate. “That’s a pretty new sentiment.”

And that’s why, “in the post-Dobbs world, I just think anyone who’s working on this issue needs to really be careful about assumptions,” Undem said. “People can die.”