Policy Solutions
When truth is under assault and moral clarity is in short supply, MAZON is a voice for both, offering an honest perspective on the reality of hunger and forging solutions grounded in Jewish values. Our expertise positions us well to understand that the path forward requires robust policy intervention at all levels of government.
Unprecedented Attacks Against Food Assistance
Right now, the landscape of food assistance in America is not the result of difficult tradeoffs or honest debate. It is the result of deliberate policy choices.
In 2025, Congress passed the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA)” into law, cutting and restructuring the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). The law’s enactment ushered in an era of uncertainty for millions of food insecure Americans. SNAP, America’s once flagship food safety net program, is set to see nearly $200 billion in cuts over the next decade.
Across the country, barriers are multiplying and funding is being dismantled faster than communities can respond. At every level of government, the message being sent to hungry families is clear. Certain policymakers are funding tax cuts for the wealthy at the expense of those in need. MAZON’s response: we will not accept this. Not now. Not ever.
We can end hunger, but we have to think big and focus on bold policies. MAZON puts policymakers at the center of the solution, providing comprehensive guidance on smart, scalable legislation that reimagines nutrition programs.
One Year Into the 'Big Beautiful Bill'
We are reflecting on the heartbreaking reality that millions cannot afford basic necessities like food because our anti-poverty programs have been slashed to fund trillions in tax cuts for the rich.
Learn About Hunger
Hunger is happening right now, in every state, in every kind of community: urban and rural, young and old, working and unemployed. Understanding it is the first step toward ending it.
Raise Your Voice
Congress decides whether food assistance programs are strengthened or dismantled. Your representatives need to hear directly from constituents who understand what is at stake.
Visit MAZON’s Hunger Museum
MAZON’s fully virtual experience, The Hunger Museum, explores the history of hunger over more than 100 years, telling the story of how policy responses nearly solved hunger in the U.S. Take a self-guided tour or schedule a facilitated tour for your group and turn history into motivation for change.
Fighting Hunger at the Federal Level
MAZON’s federal advocacy campaigns extend the importance of systemic change to lawmakers in Washington, pressing them to protect and strengthen the programs that stand between millions of people and hunger. We bring policymakers comprehensive, evidence based-guidance on smart, scalable legislation, and we hold them accountable when they fail the people they represent.
What stands between these federal initiatives and their full potential is not a lack of evidence. It is a lack of political will. MAZON builds that will, through direct legislative engagement, coalition building, legal action, and a moral clarity that refuses to treat hunger as acceptable collateral damage in any budget negotiation.
Federal Food Assistance Programs
Federal nutrition programs are among the most effective anti-poverty tools this country has ever built. They exist because sound policy, not the charitable sector alone, is the surest path to ending hunger.
MAZON works to defend and expand that policy foundation, so these programs can reach every person who needs them.
Ending hunger is not just sound policy. It is a moral obligation.
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP)
SNAP was created to be the cornerstone of America’s nutrition safety net, designed to reduce food insecurity, improve health outcomes, and support economic stability for millions of Americans each day.
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Since its creation, SNAP has lifted millions of families out of poverty and become one of the most effective anti-hunger tools in American history.
Today, it is the program under the most sustained and coordinated attack. MAZON fights every attempt to cut, restrict, or dismantle SNAP and fights to expand it to the millions who need it but cannot access it.
Child Nutrition
Federal child nutrition programs, including school meals, summer feeding initiatives, and the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC), were built on a simple idea: no child should go to school hungry, and no child should go to bed hungry.
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For decades, these programs have improved child health, school performance, and family stability, proof that these are achievable policy outcomes, not aspirational statements.
Today, they remain among the most direct investments this country can make in its children, even as funding and eligibility face growing threats. MAZON fights to strengthen, expand, and protect every one of them.
Senior Feeding Programs
Meals on Wheels, the Senior Farmers Market Nutrition Program, and congregate meal sites were designed to support older adults and make sure they don’t go hungry.
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For years, these programs have kept older adults fed, connected, and out of poverty. Yet one in seven older adults in America lives in poverty, and three in five who are eligible for SNAP do not receive it.
These programs are chronically underfunded and under threat. MAZON fights to protect and expand every program that stands between an older adult and hunger.
Tribal Food Assistance
The Food Distribution Program on Indian Reservations (FDPIR) was created to provide food assistance to Native American Tribal communities, serving nearly 90,000 people monthly.
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For decades, FDPIR has served as a vital food source for Native American communities on reservations, particularly in areas without easy access to grocery stores.
However, chronic underfunding leaves enormous gaps. MAZON fights for full funding and Tribal food sovereignty. That means pushing to expand and make permanent authority, so Tribal governments, not the federal government, control the food their own people receive.
Fighting Hunger at the State and Local Level
MAZON’s state and local advocacy campaigns extend the importance of systemic change to our partners in the Jewish community and the anti-hunger field. We empower and organize these partners to effectively advance the interests and dignity of those who struggle to put food on the table. This work is concentrated where need is greatest and where local partners have the ability to drive change.
MAZON invests directly in the people and organizations leading this fight, funding the advocates building tomorrow’s campaigns and mobilizing the communities who power them today.
Grassroots Advocacy
Community Engagement
MAZON engages local communities directly, connecting synagogues, Jewish community organizations, and everyday advocates to the campaigns shaping food policy where they live.
Building Capacity
Emerging Advocacy Fund
Through the Emerging Advocacy Fund (EAF), MAZON helps build the capacity of state-based advocacy organizations, equipping them to organize, lobby, and win.
Historic Cuts Are Becoming State Crises
The largest cuts to SNAP in the program’s history were passed in Washington, DC, but they are now impacting every state across the country.
New administrative costs, new benefit costs, new work requirements, and the loss of nutrition education funding are all landing on states at once, each one forcing difficult decisions with no good options. These cuts shift the burden of fighting hunger from the federal government onto states and local communities. This is why MAZON’s advocacy continues at the state and local levels.
The Cost Shift to States
State and local governments are being forced to absorb unprecedented costs, and some may be forced to restrict eligibility or abandon SNAP altogether, leaving millions more without food assistance.
This is a true inflection point in the fight to end hunger, and advocates are key to fighting back. MAZON invests in state and local advocacy, building the capacity of local advocates to meet these battles as they unfold.
Administrative Costs
States must now cover 75 percent of SNAP’s administrative costs, up from 50 percent.
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This shift strains state budgets before a single benefit dollar is even considered, forcing some states to choose between funding SNAP properly and funding other essential services.
Program Costs
Beginning in 2027, most states will be required to help pay for SNAP benefits directly for the first time in the program’s history.
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States with the highest payment error rates could be responsible for up to 15 percent of benefit costs, a bill some may not be able to pay without cutting eligibility or leaving the program.
Work Requirements
Expanded work reporting requirements mean more paperwork, more verification, and more administrative burden for state agencies already stretched thin.
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Veterans, people experiencing homelessness, and former foster youth, previously exempt, are now subject to these requirements as well, with no additional federal funding to manage the added caseload.
The End of SNAP-Ed
Federal funding for SNAP’s nutrition education program has been eliminated entirely.
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States and local organizations are left to absorb or abandon a program that helped families stretch their food budgets and make healthier choices with limited income.
The Latest
MAZON Statements
Official statements from MAZON, including timely responses and policy perspectives on key issues related to hunger and food security.
Advocates Demand Meaningful SNAP Restoration in Negotiated Senate Farm Bill
- Congress, Farm Bill
Jewish Anti-Hunger Advocates: Public Charge Rule an ‘Abomination’
- White House
Anti-Hunger Advocate Denounces Senate Farm Bill Proposal for Ignoring SNAP Crisis
- Congress, Farm Bill, SNAP
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Join Us in Action
MAZON needs your support in the fight to end hunger.
Together, we know it’s possible.