The U.S. Department of Agriculture is proposing that families who receive temporary government benefits should no longer be automatically eligible for food assistance, a change that could restrict access to free school lunches for 265,000 children. In California, about 3.2 million children use free school lunches, according to the California Department of Education. It is unclear how many children would no longer be eligible if this rule went into effect.
Under the proposal, about 3.1 million people would lose access to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which provides money for food to low-income Americans and is commonly called food stamps.
