Tucson Rep. Juan Ciscomani says don't cut Medicaid, SNAP or Pell

Tucson Republican U.S. Rep. Juan Ciscomani and others advocate against federal aid cuts for SNAP, Pell Grants and Medicaid, but uphold support for funding President Donald Trump’s border security agenda in a letter from the Congressional Hispanic Conference.

The conference, a group of Hispanic Republicans in Congress, sent a letter to House Speaker Mike Johnson Wednesday about protecting Hispanic American communities from budget cuts in the new House budget.

The House Budget Committee approved its proposed 2025 fiscal year budget on Feb. 13, which is aimed at reducing mandatory spending by approximately $2 trillion, but the House has not voted on it yet. Both the House and the Senate must pass the same budget for it to be accepted and finalized.

Ciscomani and the conference wrote they are advocating for a budget that supports Hispanic people, saying they “played a decisive role in securing a Republic majority in 2025.”

“Hispanic Americans stood with us because we stood up for them on the issues that matter,” the letter stated.

It said they hope to find a budget that can eliminate “fraud, waste, and abuse,” but also not “undermine programs that support working-class Americans.”

Programs with significant percentages of Hispanic beneficiaries were emphasized in the letter as needing sustained funding and to be safe from cuts.

The letter said nearly 30% of Medicaid enrollees are Hispanic, nearly 22% of Hispanic families depend on assistance programs, including the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits “as a temporary safety net during difficult times,” and that 82% of full-time Latino students as of 2015-16 “relied on grants and loans, including Pell Grants, to afford college.”

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The conference also called for the House to fully fund efforts in border security and complete the southern border wall.

They wrote that there is a need to improve communication systems for law enforcement at the border and increase ICE detention capacity while also hiring more border security.

The House Committee on Energy and Commerce is instructed to cut $880 billion from spending in the new budget, much of which will come from health care programs like Medicaid.

“Slashing Medicaid would have serious consequences,” the letter stated, “particularly in rural and predominantly Hispanic communities where hospitals and nursing homes are already struggling to keep their doors open.”

Similarly, both the House Committee on Agriculture and the Committee on Education and the Work Force are tasked with finding budget cuts of greater than $200 billion each.

The jurisdiction of these committees includes programs including Pell Grants and SNAP, which help low-income families buy food.

“If we are serious about empowering the next generation and strengthening our workforce,” the letter stated, “we must facilitate, and not undermine, opportunities that help students succeed.”