Sen. Martin Heinrich joined local nonprofit leaders and SNAP recipients to discuss the effects federal cuts to the SNAP program could have on New Mexico.
Heinrich, who has been a vocal opponent to The One Big Beautiful Bill which was passed into law in July, called the cuts that were included on the bill harmful and said many New Mexicans are at risk of facing struggles.
“I think if somebody had tried to craft legislation that would be more fundamentally harmful to the state of New Mexico they would have a really hard time doing it,” Heinrich said during the meeting.
Heinrich also said that New Mexico will see a “decline of over 40%” in SNAP benefits. Sovereign Hager with the New Mexico Center on Law and Poverty called out the work requirements that come with the cuts and how many people could be kicked off because of them.
“They will impact about 55,000 New Mexicans at a minimum and we have always had some version of these exist in the SNAP program but there has been an understanding that we are not going to require people to work when unemployment is very high,” Hager said. “That is ending now.”
Also in attendance for the meeting was New Mexico State University student and SNAP participant Jasmine Jacquez. She said that she has used this system for assistance for much of her life and she needs it now to support her child.
“For me, my goal is to get out of it because I know that there are a lot of people that need it so that is why I am going to school to better myself and to give my son a better future where we can go without any sort of assistance but currently we are in the system,” Jaquez said.
This roundtable was part of a larger tour around the Las Cruces area in which Heinrich visited with community members to discuss other federal cuts and look at developments at NMSU.