White House Announces Plan To Fund WIC From Tariff Revenue

After Kaorline Leavitt Announced The White House Is Using Tariff Money On This Important Woman’s Program, Gavin Newsom Backhandedly Thanked Them
The government shutdown has threatened a special nutrition assistance program for several million women, infants and children.
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The Donald Trump administration will use tariff revenue to prevent a special nutrition program for pregnant women and mothers of young children from running out of money during the government shutdown.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt announced the legally questionable plan on Tuesday afternoon as the shutdown entered its second week.
The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children would otherwise run out of backup money for its six million beneficiaries sometime in the coming days, according to advocates for the program.
“The Democrats are so cruel in their continual votes to shut down the government that they forced the WIC program for the most vulnerable women and children to run out this week,” Leavitt said. WIC is known formally as the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children.
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“Thankfully, President Trump and the White House have identified a creative solution to transfer resources from Section 232 tariff revenue to this critical program,” Leavitt said. “The Trump White House will not allow impoverished mothers and their babies to go hungry because of the Democrats’ political games.”
Twitter: @PressSec
Democrats in Congress had no public reaction to the news, but California Gov. Gavin Newsom offered a rare bit of praise for the administration.
“Literally the bare minimum the White House should do right now,” Newsom said on X. “But thanks?”
@GavinNewsom/@axios/X / Via Twitter: @GavinNewsom
The government isn’t supposed to spend money that Congress hasn’t appropriated, and money for WIC ran out last week along with everything else when appropriations lapsed on Tuesday at midnight. The program provides debit cards that low-income moms can use for infant formula and healthy food at grocery stores.
The National WIC Association, a nonprofit that advocates on behalf of state agencies that distribute WIC benefits, said last week leftover money could keep the program afloat for only “a week or two” during a shutdown. The group put out a cautious statement about the White House’s tariff plan.
“We welcome efforts to keep WIC afloat during the shutdown, but families need long-term stability, not short-term uncertainty,” National WIC Association Georgia Machell said in a press release. “We still don’t know how much funding this measure provides, how quickly states will receive it, or how long it will sustain operations.”
Zoe Neuberger, a senior fellow at the liberal Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, noted that while few details about the White House plan were available, the importance of WIC couldn’t be overstated.
“Turning away eligible children could have led to both immediate and lasting effects on their health,” Neuberger told HuffPost in an emailed statement. “Keeping the program open means families with very young children who are struggling to put food on the table can get the nutritious foods and important services they need to stay healthy.”
President Trump has boasted frequently about the hundreds of billions in revenue the federal government has taken in from his new taxes on imported goods, suggesting the money could be used to help farmers or even to fund dividend checks to American households. The WIC program is relatively small, costing about $7 billion annually.
Budget experts said saving WIC with tariff revenue amounted to a presidential power grab.
“At the risk of sounding alarmist, this sounds like another nail in the coffin for Article I,” Daniel Bunn, president of the conservative Tax Foundation, said on social media, referring to the part of the Constitution establishing the legislative branch of government. “If [the Supreme Court] doesn’t act to limit the President’s tariff powers, and the President can just ignore the expired spending legislation, then why do you need Congress?”
@danieldbunn/@scottlincicome/X / Via x.com
The White House and Republicans on Capitol Hill have repeatedly highlighted the danger to WIC recipients from a shutdown as a reason for Democrats to vote to fund the government. On Monday, White House spokesperson Kush Desai told CNN there was no need to tap tariff revenue.
“We don’t need any novel solutions to reduce the blow of the Democrats’ government shutdown — all that needs to happen is the Democrats reopening the government by passing a clean continuing resolution as they’ve done many times before,” Desai said.
House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) said last week Republicans “can’t stand” the WIC program, suggesting the Trump administration was treating it unfavorably in the shutdown. No Democrats had reacted publicly to Leavitt’s announcement as of Tuesday evening.
This article originally appeared on HuffPost.