Tag Archives: Health and Human Services (HHS)

Unfortunate Consequences Of Bad Behavior

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On Wednesday, Breitbart posted an article about the halting of child care and family assistance funds for California, Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota, and New York.

The article reports:

“Families who rely on child care and family assistance programs deserve confidence that these resources are used lawfully and for their intended purpose,” Deputy Secretary Jim O’Neill said in a written statement. “This action reflects our commitment to program integrity, fiscal responsibility, and compliance with federal requirements.”

The HHS will freeze access three programs that the HHS’s Administration for Children and Families (ACF) oversees, which includes the Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF), Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), and the Social Services Block Grant (SSBG).

HHS will restrict:

    • $2.4 billion for the CCDF
    • $7.35 billion for TANF
    • $869 million for the SSBG

The government that provides for you can also stop providing for you. That is a lesson all Americans need to learn. Hopefully investigations can proceed quickly and legal funds can be restored where they are needed.

The article concludes:

The funds to three blue-run states will continue to be frozen until ACF determines that the states are in compliance with federal requirements.

“For too long, Democrat-led states and Governors have been complicit in allowing massive amounts of fraud to occur under their watch,” a health department spokesperson said in a statement to ABC News.

The spokesperson stated that the administration is “ensuring that federal taxpayer dollars are being used for legitimate purposes.”

One senior Trump administration official said that the child care programs were frozen due to “rampant fraud” and that money was given to illegal aliens.

Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA), in response to a post by President Donald Trump claiming that the investigation into fraud in California has begun, called the 47th president a “deranged, habitual liar whose relationship with reality ended years ago.”

Gov. Kathy Hochul (D-NY) called the incoming funding freeze a “frontal assault” on children.

“We will fight this with every fiber of our being because our kids should not be political paws in a fight that Donald Trump seems to have with blue state governors,” she continued.

This is unfortunate, but so are the years of rampant corruption. Bad behavior has consequences, and innocent people get hurt. Hopefully the churches and charities will help cover the gaps.

Making America Healthy Again

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On Wednesday, NBC News posted an article about the new U.S. dietary guide.

The article reports:

The Trump administration released updated U.S. dietary guidelines Wednesday, encouraging Americans to eat more protein and full-fat dairy, while cutting back on ultra-processed foods and added sugars.

The guidelines — which are updated every five years by the Agriculture and Health and Human Services departments — largely align with Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s “Make America Healthy Again” movement, but stop short of the sweeping changes some nutrition experts had expected.

Gone is the MyPlate visual guide for what foods to eat — which recommended filling your plate with roughly equal parts grains, vegetables, protein and fruit with a small portion of dairy.

Instead, an updated version of the food pyramid is back, this time inverted and slightly jumbled. Protein, dairy and healthy fats, along with vegetables and fruits, dominate; whole grains are de-emphasized.

The new guide is much closer to the American diet before the beef shortage of 1973. It is also closer to the American diet before obesity became common. The change in the American diet from meat protein to grains is not the only culprit in America’s obesity epidemic. Fast food (which actually used to be cheap), processed food, excessive amounts of sugar in foods, and high fructose corn syrup all play a role.

The article includes the new food pyramid:

Revising the food pyramid is one more step toward making America healthy again.

The article concludes:

The recommendations call for avoiding ultra-processed foods, added sugars and refined carbohydrates. It singles out prepackaged snacks such as chips, cookies and candy in favor of “nutrient-dense foods” and home-prepared meals.

Added sugars should be limited to 10 grams per meal. To help people identify added sugar, the guidance advises checking the ingredient list for terms that include “sugar,” “syrup” or ingredients that end in “-ose.”

Fruits and vegetables should be consumed “in their original form,” although frozen, dried or canned fruits and vegetables can be a good option if they include no or very limited added sugars.

On sodium, the guidelines are unchanged: Most people ages 14 and up should consume less than 2,300 milligrams per day. Recommendation limits are lower for children, ranging from less than 1,200 mg per day to 1,800 mg per day.

The new guidelines appear to remove specific daily limits on alcohol, which were previously set at no more than one drink per day for women and two for men.

Instead, it advises Americans to drink “less alcohol for better overall health.”

The Impact of DOGE

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On Friday, Breitbart posted an article about some of the changes President Trump is making in the federal workforce.

The article reports:

New Office of Personnel Management (OPM) Director Scott Kupor told several news outlets, most recently the New York Times, that the federal workforce will drop from 2.4 million to 2.1 million employees, largely as the result of the Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE) efforts.

In a lengthy interview this week with Washington, DC, station WTOP, Kupor said that up to 80 percent of the reductions come from federal workers choosing to access buyouts or another program that paid them while they looked for other work.

The article concludes:

CNN has featured a tracker of employee reductions implemented by the Trump administration. The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) dismissed some 10,000 employees when it was dismantled entirely.

Others, as Breitbart News reported,  include more than 20,000 employees reportedly cut or accepting buyouts at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Some 7,300 have been dismissed at the Internal Revenue Service, according to the CNN tracker.

Kupor told the Times he doesn’t expect any significant new layoff announcements this year, Forbes reported.

Kupor, confirmed to his position in July, comes from the private sector, where he was a managing partner at Andreessen Horowitz, a venture capital firm.

He told the TV station he’s well aware of the personal consequences for some of those who no longer have federal jobs.

“I recognize and understand we’re talking about very serious things. Anytime we do layoffs or reductions, you know, that impacts people’s families, it impacts people’s friends, it impacts their ability to be contributing members to their community,” he said. “And look, we need to recognize and understand that is a difficult thing for people to live through.”