To the Editor:
I came across the most maddening sentence in Oct. 29th’s well-written article on the Lazarus House. The point of the article was to illustrate a 30% increase in clients of this locally famous food pantry. The head of Lazarus House spoke to reasons for the increase, namely actions taken at the federal level, which include proposing to cut the SNAP program by $186 billion nationwide, according to the article. The head of Lazarus House goes on to say that the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture has been directed not to report numbers on food insecurity because it is too political, again, according to the article.
This is the maddening part of the article, that reporting numbers of food insecurity is too political. What on earth is so political about such information? I’ll tell you why it’s “political”: It’s Donald Trump ordering another federal agency to cover up information that would reflect poorly on his policy making, and he can’t and won’t have that.
Kind of like his banning the use of the word “riot” in any legal description of the rampage that occurred on Jan.6, 2021. Trump and his team know that banning words, books and depictions of slavery, and withholding other damning statistics and information will keep us citizens ignorant of the truth.
In this case, he has ordered the USDA to withhold the numbers of Americans who are suffering because they don’t have enough food, plain and simple, and that would be a source of embarrassment to the president as he builds a $300 million party wing onto the White House.
This kind of conduct is a disgrace, and all politicians who toe the Trump line should not be permitted to serve the public, or be voted out of office.
Terence O’Neill
Wildwood
