Senator Sessions: Administration Ignoring Laws That Prohibit Visas For ‘Likely’ Welfare Recipients

 The Obama administration is waiving a law that requires it to deny visas and entry to non-citizens who are “likely at any time to become” a government dependent – and is ignoring requests for information regarding this move, Sen. Jeff Sessions said today.

Sen. Sessions (R-AL), Ranking Member of the Senate Budget Committee, issued a statement after USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack missed the deadline to reply to oversight requests for data on expenditures for non-citizens on food stamps and information regarding the administration’s waiver of federal immigration law:

“Included in the oversight letter was a request for information about USDA’s contact with the Departments of State and Homeland Security regarding immigration law. Both DHS and DOS have effectively nullified the federal law that prohibits admission into the U.S. for those likely to become welfare reliant, further enabling USDA to surge non-citizen registration.”

“Such activities cannot be justified to the American people, which probably explains why the Administration has been unwilling to provide answers,” Sen. Sessions said.

According to section 212 of the Immigration and Nationality Act, which defines “Classes of aliens ineligible for visas or admission”:

“Any alien who, in the opinion of the consular officer at the time of application for a visa, or in the opinion of the Attorney General at the time of application for admission or adjustment of status, is likely at any time to become a public charge is inadmissible.”

Via: CNS News

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Number Of Americans On Food Stamps Hits Another Record High

While the lowest unemployment rate of President Barack Obama’s tenure dominated weekend economic news, a less-welcome statistic for the White House — a record number 0f food-stamp recipients — slipped by with barely a notice.

About 46.68 million Americans received food stamps in July, the government said in a report released late on Friday afternoon before a holiday weekend, a traditional time for dumping bad news. The report for July, the most recent month that data was available, showed participation up by 11,532 from June and 2.9 percent higher than a year earlier.

The number rose partly because of weather disasters in Ohio, Maryland and West Virginia, the USDA said. In essence, it was little changed from the previous month or even the recent past, since participation — more than one in seven Americans — has topped 46 million since September 2011.

Still, any jump in food-stamp rolls pushes a button with Republicans who argue hat the program breeds dependency and its growth shows both an unhealthy economy and wasteful spending.

“When the president took office, 32 million people on food stamps — 47 million on food stamps today,” Republican Mitt Romney said in last week’s presidential debate. “Going forward with the status quo is not going to cut it for the American people who are struggling.”

Monthly spending on food stamps in July reached $6.26 billion, also a record and 2.9 percent more than a year earlier.

The program’s cost more than doubled in four years to a record $75.7 billion in the 12 months ended Sept. 30, 2011, and is the USDA’s biggest annual expense.

A USDA spokesman was unable to provide comment on the timing of the report, when contacted on the federal Columbus Day holiday. The report normally comes early in the month, although there is no set date or time.

Via: Bloomberg

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USDA Tax-Payer-Funded Workshop Attendees Instructed To Chant ‘Our Forefathers Were Illegal Immigrants’

The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) paid Chicago consultants over $200,000 in taxpayer money to put on diversity training workshops that included activities in which employees were instructed to chant "our forefathers were illegal immigrants." 

The government watchdog group Judicial Watch alleged in documents released this week that these programs only served to promote and enforce left-wing political agendas. 

A USDA department official said the statements were not reflective of USDA policy, and the consultants merely had "participants repeat provocative and potentially offensive phrases as part of an exercise to examine stereotypes."

According to Judicial Watch, the USDA has given at least $200,000 to the company Souder, Betances & Associates over the last two years for similar diversity training programs and workshops. 

According to Judicial Watch, a tipster told the organization that speakers led USDA employees in chants such as "our forefathers were illegal immigrants" while encouraging participants to pound on the table. 

The USDA sent a statement to Fox News claiming the sessions were meant to "foster overall diversity awareness." 

"USDA offers a number of optional workshops and professional development opportunities in order to help employees better serve our customers," the statement said. "The Souder Betances & Associates sessions were designed to foster overall diversity awareness -- not to focus on any specific minority group -- and received positive feedback from employees across the department."

And yet, the USDA has been hesitant to release documents to Judicial Watch and cooperate with the group for the ongoing investigation. 

Via: Breitbart

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REPORT: JP MORGAN MAKES OVER HALF A BILLION DOLLARS OFF FOOD STAMPS

A new report by the Government Accountability Institute finds that JP Morgan has made at least $560,492,596 since 2004 processing the Electronic Benefits Transfer (EBT) cards of 18 of the 24 states it has under contract for the food stamp program.

Indeed, JP Morgan’s Christopher Paton told Bloomberg News that food stamps are big business for the big bank: 

“We are the largest processor of food stamps in the country…[the EBT program] is a very important business to JP Morgan. It’s an important business in terms of its size and scale…. Right now volumes have gone through the roof in the past couple of years or so. The good news from JP Morgan’s perspective is the infrastructure that we built has been able to cope with that increase in volume.”

While some may be glad that a private company—not a government agency—is tasked with EBT transactions, the GAI report reveals that JP Morgan does not use the same fraud detection systems commonly used by today’s credit card companies.  In fact, federal and state agencies—not EBT processors—are the ones tasked with policing food stamp fraud. 

That means EBT processors enjoy multiple pathways to profits that run counter to efficiency and strong oversight.  For example, writes GAI president Peter Schweizer:

 Any time TANF recipients withdraw their cash benefits or make balance inquiries through out-of-network ATM machines, the user may incur ATM transaction fees generally ranging from $.75 to $1.50. In addition, most states allow EBT processors to charge card replacement fees. Arizona cardholders, for example, are permitted one free replacement a year, after which a $5 per card fee is imposed. The same goes for customer service calls: After an EBT cardholder exceeds the state’s maximum number of free calls, EBT processors typically tack on a $.25 per call fee.

By making welfare inefficiency and abuse lucrative, the poverty industry has created a potentially toxic brew of corporate cronyism and government inefficiency that lets food stamp abuse enforcement slip through the bureaucratic cracks:

 According to the USDA’s website, the federal food stamp program has “over 100” inspectors to police the nearly 200,000 retailers nationwide that accept EBT cards. For its part, the state of Florida has 63 positions allocated to police over 3 million EBT users. JP Morgan is currently involved in an eight-month pilot project with Florida focused on EBT fraud and abuse. The total staff? Just one JP Morgan employee and five to ten state employees, according to Florida officials.

So how did EBT processors like JP Morgan land its lucrative half-billion dollars worth of contracts? 

Via: Breitbart

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Complaints Mount Against Michelle Obama’s New Lunch Menu

In Wisconsin, high school athletes are complaining about not getting enough to eat each day, due to the skimpy new school lunch menu mandated by the United States Department of Agriculture and First Lady Michelle Obama.

The story we published earlier this week on that subject is unfortunately not unique. Students across the country are complaining about the new school lunch regulations.

Perhaps the real motive is to starve students into slimming down. Just ask students in Pierre, South Dakota who, too, are in an all-out revolt.

"I know a lot of my friends who are just drinking a jug of milk for their lunch. And they are not getting a proper meal," middle school student Samantha Gortmaker told Keloland.com.

Despite the fact that the new regulations have increased the cost of a lunch 20 to 25 cents per plate, it’s not pleasing students.

Some are throwing away their vegetables while others are adapting to the rules by becoming industrious. In New Bedford, Massachusetts, students have created a black market - for chocolate syrup. The kiddie capitalists are smuggling in bottles of it and selling it by the squeeze, according toSouthCoastToday.com.

Nancy Carvalho, director of food services for New Bedford Public Schools, was quoted as saying that hummus and black bean salads have been tough sells in elementary cafeterias. That means even smaller children are going through the day fighting hunger pains, which can never be considered a good thing.

One government official tried to put the blame on the students.

"One thing I think we need to keep in mind as kids say they're still hungry is that many children aren't used to eating fruits and vegetables at home, much less at school. So it's a change in what they are eating. If they are still hungry, it's that they are not eating all the food that's being offered," USDA Deputy Undersecretary Janey Thornton was quoted as saying.

Ms. Thornton just put her finger on the problem. The government is trying to impose a new diet that children are not accustomed to. It’s not reasonable to expect them to either eat what the government deems healthy or go hungry.

Many will opt to go hungry, and that’s the government’s fault.

Via: Townhall

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160! – We have 160 Federal Programs That Deal With Housing

Sen. Jim DeMint’s (R-SC) senior communications advisor and speechwriter, Amanda Carpenter, who was recently a columnist for The Washington Times, penned an interesting post on the senator’s page, the Pickpocket, concerning how many federal programs deal with housing.  A whopping 160 federal programs is “how many the Government Accountability Office tallied in a recent report that noted, ‘fiscal realities raise questions about the efficiency of multiple housing programs and activities across federal agencies with similar goals, products, and sometimes parallel delivery systems.”

The post, which Carpenter wrote on September 20, also reported that:

…HUD runs the majority of the programs, 91. The United States Department of Agriculture, which also administers farming aid and the nation’s food stamp program, offers 18 different types of housing assistance as well. The Internal Revenue Service has 14 programs. The Department of Treasury offers 8 programs; the Department of Veterans Affairs 7; the Department of Labor 2; Federal Home Loan Banks 3.

The rest of the activities are run through a number of organizations, such as the Department of Interior,  the Federal Reserve System, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Ginnie Mae, Farmer Mac, the Federal Housing Finance Agency, and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, to name a few.

Here’s GAO’s complete inventory of programs, available in the “Table of Contents” on this page.

If President Obama had truly wanted to consolidate wasteful government programs, he sure had the chance. Especially when it comes to housing. He just never took it.

GAO recommended that the government begin taking action to consolidate programs at HUD, USDA, and Treasury, a goal completely compatible the Single Family Housing Task Force that the Obama Administration announced in February 2011.

Carpenter noted that this finding has amounted to little more than a press release.  However, it’s another episode in the annals of government inefficiency.  For a minute – I thought that this could be the foundation for a good movie, but I forgot that it’s already been made.

Via: Green Room

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STUDY: 15% OF COUNTRY ON FOOD STAMPS

The country’s unemployment rate has been above eight percent for 43 months, which is longer than during any recession since 1980, and a Manhattan Institute study found that 15 percent of the country is now on food stamps, which is a record non-emergency high. 

The study found that three years after the Great Recession began in December of 2007 and was declared over in June of 2009, 47 million people each month are using the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). According to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), which administers the program, “fewer than one in 10 Americans” were on food stamps before the Great Recession. Currently, more than one in seven Americans are on food stamps.

“There is much concern surrounding this unprecedented increase in America's SNAP program, which began in 2008,” the authors of the study wrote. “Our results demonstrate that levels seen since the end of this recession are far higher than in prior recoveries.”

According to the study, food stamp usage “has been far higher both during the 2007–09 recession and thereafter than following prior recessions.” For instance, when the Great Recession began, 9.3 percent of Americans were on food stamps. In June of 2009, when the Great Recession was deemed to have ended, 11.4 percent were on food stamps. In June of 2012, 14.9 percent of Americans were on food stamps, which accounts for a 3.5 percentage point increase since the recession was declared over. 

In some states, over twenty percent of the population is on food stamps. These states include Oregon, Mississippi, New Mexico, and Tennessee. 

In Washington, D.C., 23% of the population is on food stamps. 

Via: Breitbart

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THE FOOD STAMP RECOVERY: The Unprecedented Increase in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program 2008–12

Three years after the end of the 2007–09 recession, which officially began in December 2007 and ended in June 2009, 47 million people each month are using the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). At the beginning of the recession, fewer than one in 10 Americans received SNAP benefits. Nearly 15 percent of Americans now use SNAP benefits, formerly called food stamps, a program administered by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). This translates to more than one in 7 Americans currently using SNAP benefits, a record non-emergency high.[2]

There is much concern surrounding this unprecedented increase in America's SNAP program, which began in 2008. Food stamp participation has always increased during a recession and in the initial stages of a recovery. The purpose of this report is to determine whether the recent increase in SNAP participation is comparable to increases during other recent recessions. Our results demonstrate that levels seen since the end of this recession are far higher than in prior recoveries (see Figure 1). 

While the 36 month periods following the recessions of the early 1980s saw decreases in food stamp usage, the recessions of the early 1990s and in 2001 saw increases between 1 and 2 percent over the same period, in comparison with an increase of 3.5 percent following the recession ending in 2009. In addition to the difficult job market, this is because of changes in the program that began in October 2008, including expansion of benefits and elimination of the cap for child care expenses.

Via: Manhattan Institute
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Agriculture Department Paid $2 Million for a Single Intern

A report from the Agriculture Department’s Inspector General has revealed some stunning examples of financial waste in the Department’s nascent technology security efforts, which have mismanaged about $63 million in taxpayer funding.

Among the IG’s findings: the USDA spent more than $2 million on an internship program that only hired one full-time intern, $3 million on technology hardware that was never used, and $235,000 on a project that was later canceled due to redundancy.

The office of USDA’s chief information officer, which was the subject of the report, “had not established internal control procedures, such as monitoring and oversight, for project management, and did not adequately plan its projects or how it would utilize resources,” the IG noted in explaining the underlying causes of financial mismanagement.

“With proper coordination within OCIO and improved communication between project managers, these unnecessary costs could have been avoided,” the IG explained. But because USDA has so far failed to address those underlying issues, “the Department is still at significant risk” for further financial losses.

Some highlights from the report:

• “OCIO [Office of the CIO] funded an intern program for a total of $2 million which, while funded as a security enhancement project, only resulted in one intern being hired full-time for ASOC [the Agriculture Security Operations Center]… This project is intended to develop and sustain a highly skilled IT security and computer technology workforce.  Expenditures for FY 2010 and 2011 included over $686,000 for development and implementation of a networking website and approximately $192,500 in housing costs for two summers.  While the intern program may be a beneficial step in the long-run, it did little to further the more pressing objective of improving USDA’s IT security.”
• “In FYs 2010 and 2011, OCIO spent at least $1.8 million to acquire four tools for the security sensor array project—which are not currently used—and subsequently spent additional annual maintenance costs of approximately $1.2 million.  In addition, OCIO determined that one of these tools, costing approximately $425,000, could not handle the amount of data that USDA’s network generates.  OCIO has maintained this tool at a cost of approximately $81,000 annually but has not been able to utilize it.”
• “In FY 2010, OCIO spent $235,000 to research possible solutions for a project intended to prevent data leakage outside of USDA networks. The project was subsequently cancelled because its goals were redundant with another ongoing project, the security sensor array.”

Via: The Foundry

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