WASHINGTON (ABP) — Religious leaders are calling on the consciences of members of Congress to avoid cutting social-welfare programs and taxes at the same time.
“This is the message going out [from Congress]: In response to Hurricane Katrina, we're going to cut services for the poor, taxes for the rich and we're going to increase deficits for our children and grandchildren,” said Jim Wallis, a progressive evangelical leader, at a press conference with a wide array of religious leaders Nov. 3.
“House Republicans seem to be saying they literally want to take the food from the mouths of children to make rich people richer,” he continued.
Wallis, National Council of Churches General Secretary Bob Edgar and others used the occasion of an upcoming House vote on a budget-balancing bill to call attention to the plight of spending on social programs for the poor in light of the hurricane disasters of recent months.
“We religious leaders cannot be the conscience of the president or members of Congress, but we come here today to remind them whose side God is on,” Edgar said. “We call on all representatives of good will to remember God's bias [for the poor] when they vote on cuts.”
The leaders won a small victory on the bill in the Senate Oct. 19, when that chamber's Agriculture Committee approved a measure that cut their budget without major cuts to federal food-stamp programs.
But the House of Representatives will likely vote on a version of the same bill the week of Nov. 7 that includes about $844 million in cuts to food stamps over the next five years. The bill targets legal immigrants, raising the number of years they must reside in the United States before being eligible for food stamps.
According to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office, that means about 300,000 people would no longer be eligible for food assistance.
The House Agriculture Committee passed the cuts to the program on a party-line vote Oct. 28. , Committee chair Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) was unavailable for comment Nov. 3, but in a statement released the day his committee passed the bill, he said budget priorities — including paying the bill for relief and clean-up after the hurricanes — requires difficult choices.
“It is unrealistic to think we can meet the pressing challenges facing our nation without reducing federal spending and redirecting priorities,” Goodlatte said.
He also noted that the cuts represent less than one half of one percent of total spending on the food-stamp program, and that food stamps are bearing a disproportionately small share of the cuts that earlier congressional action required.
“While food stamps comprise nearly 60 percent of the [Agriculture] Committee's mandatory spending, it received less than 25 percent of the total savings under the [budget-reduction] package and only applies to non-citizens with a permanent residency status of less than seven years,” Goodlatte said. “By tightening the eligibility requirements, this legislation ensures that the nation's most needy will continue to receive their federal assistance.”
But the religious leaders, who followed their press conference with a trip into the Capitol Rotunda to pray silently, noted that the Republican leadership in Congress and President Bush want to pass $70 billion in tax cuts — the fifth tax cut in as many years. Not cutting those taxes would more than cover the budget-balancing now being done by cutting social programs.
“Compassionate conservatism in this present atmosphere is an oxymoron,” said Thomas Hoyt, president of the National Council of Churches, who also serves as a bishop in the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church, serving the hurricane-devastated Louisiana and Mississippi region.
As the leaders entered the Rotunda for their prayer session, they happened across House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.). They pulled him aside and explained their opposition to the cuts to food stamps and other programs. Hastert appeared to listen politely and said little in response. He left quickly.