When Hunger Becomes Policy: The Economics of Cruelty
“When a nation turns hunger into leverage, it is no longer negotiating policy — it is breaking the human bond on which democracy depends.” - Mary Coughlin
When Hunger Becomes Policy: The Economics of Cruelty
A Nation Traumatized by Design
Cowardice, Collusion, and the Myth of Powerlessness
In the richest nation on earth, hunger has become a policy choice.
Over 42 million Americans rely on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) to feed their families. And now, the Trump administration has announced it will not use the $6 billion in reserve funds Congress explicitly provided to ensure those benefits continue during a government shutdown.
This is not a bureaucratic lapse. It is a deliberate act, a weaponization of food insecurity, and it tells us exactly who and what this administration values.
A Nation Traumatized by Design
From a trauma-informed lens, this is more than an economic crisis. It is a collective trauma event.
When the government, the system meant to protect its people, becomes the source of harm, it activates deep relational wounds. Trauma occurs not just in what happens, but in the betrayal of trust, the breaking of safety, and the erosion of belonging.
Families already stretched to their limit now face empty refrigerators and impossible choices.
Children who rely on school meals will go hungry. Elders will ration medication to buy food.
Communities already living in chronic stress will bear yet another blow.
This is how systemic trauma works, not as a single catastrophic event, but as a sustained pattern of neglect, cruelty, and betrayal by those in power.
Cowardice, Collusion, and the Myth of Powerlessness
The Trump administration’s cruelty is visible, but it thrives on a broader ecosystem of cowardice and complicity.
Congress has stood by, paralyzed, as if hunger were a partisan chess move rather than a moral emergency. And yet it’s important to be clear: defending SNAP and healthcare protections is not “obstruction.” Democratic members insisting on extending both are doing exactly what governance requires, safeguarding health and nutrition together.
The paralysis comes not from those demanding care, but from those in power who refuse to negotiate in good faith, holding the nation hostage for political leverage.
And while the public suffers, the nation’s elite, the top ten percent who live insulated from the consequences of their decisions, remain silent, watching from a safe distance.
This is not leadership. It is abdication. It is a betrayal of the public trust and it reveals how deeply moral decay has corroded the machinery of democracy.
Obstruction as Policy
House Speaker Mike Johnson has refused to bring the House back into session, leaving millions of Americans stranded without legislative recourse.
This is not procedural delay — it is deliberate obstruction. When a Speaker prevents the people’s House from functioning in a time of national crisis, he is not leading. He is withholding governance itself as a weapon.
Authoritarians don’t always seize power through violence. Sometimes they do it through paralysis by keeping the doors of democracy locked while the people starve on the steps outside.
Such behavior is not protected by office; it is an assault on the very purpose of representation.
Congress’s silence makes them accomplices. The elite who look away are no better.
The Economics of Cruelty
SNAP is not charity. It is an economic stabilizer. Every dollar of SNAP generates about $1.50 in local economic activity. keeping small grocers open, sustaining farmers, and feeding local economies.
When those dollars disappear, so do jobs, community stores, and livelihoods. Yet the same administration claiming there’s “no money for food” easily found $20 billion to prop up a political ally abroad.
This is not fiscal discipline. This is economic violence.
And as Truth Matters recently reminded us, 90% of Americans are suffering so that 10 % can enjoy more ease. This is not a partisan problem. It is an economic and moral one. A democracy that serves the comfort of the few by inflicting chronic insecurity on the many is not a democracy at all it is a trauma system with a flag.
Trauma and Economics: The Same Story
Trauma and economic exploitation are not separate phenomena, they are two faces of the same wound.
When policy becomes an instrument of fear and deprivation, it recreates the very dynamics of trauma:
Power used to dominate rather than protect
Needs dismissed or pathologized
Suffering rendered invisible
A nation that governs through harm is a nation losing its soul. And like any traumatized body, our collective nervous system is now in dysregulation, hypervigilant, exhausted, disconnected, and unable to trust those who lead.
The Call to the 90%
It is time to stop arguing about left and right and start uniting around what is right.
This is not partisan — it is human.
It is moral.
It is economic.
It is trauma-informed truth.
Here’s how we stand together:
Refuse the framing. Hunger is not a partisan issue; it’s a moral one.
Tell the stories. Share real experiences: names, faces, and neighborhoods affected. Make cruelty visible.
Demand accountability. Congress must reconvene immediately. The USDA must release the contingency funds.
Hold leaders to their oaths. Speaker Johnson’s obstruction is not politics it’s betrayal. He must be removed and investigated for dereliction of duty.
Support the helpers. Fund food banks, community grocers, and local food systems. Each act of generosity is an act of defiance.
Organize for systemic change. This is about more than one shutdown. It’s about reclaiming our social contract that government exists to care for its people.
Accountability Is Not Optional
If those in power use hunger as leverage, obstruct governance, and betray their constitutional duty to protect the people, they must face consequences.
Congress must act now to remove Speaker Johnson from leadership and to launch a full investigation into this deliberate obstruction. And if the evidence shows that these decisions were directed or sanctioned by the President, then the path of accountability must extend to the highest office in the land. That is not partisanship. It is the constitutional remedy for a betrayal of the public trust.
Because the trauma of systemic betrayal cannot heal through silence. It heals through truth, accountability, and collective courage.
When the government turns its back on its people, it’s up to the people to face each other, to feed, to fight, to rebuild. Because the question isn’t whether we can afford to feed the hungry. The question is whether we can afford the soul-cost of refusing to.
We must stand together, awake, and unafraid.
Until compassion becomes our policy.
Mary
Author’s Note:
In this moment of deliberate cruelty and misinformation, I want to be clear: standing firm for both healthcare and food assistance is not obstruction it is moral courage. Those refusing to negotiate are the ones prolonging this harm. To care is to hold the line where human dignity is at stake.
