Around the time two federal judges on Friday were ordering the Trump administration to fund the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) for millions of Americans despite a government shutdown, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins was calling SNAP "bloated" and "corrupt."

Rollins joined House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., at the Capitol for a media briefing on the federal government shutdown and focused on the Trump administration's efforts to save SNAP from waste and abuse.

Rollins said the shutdown is creating more attention on the program, "that especially under the last administration has just become so bloated, so broken, so dysfunctional, so corrupt that it is astonishing when you dig in."

She said a big focus of the administration has been removing illegal aliens from being recipients of the benefit. She said her department informed all 50 states with an order, "saying, no more illegal aliens on SNAP, period, full stop. So that's already a rule of this administration. We're working to enforce it every single day."

But Rollins said the amount of waste being uncovered is frightful. "We've had dozens of arrests, people going to jail, fraudulent activity of $50 million here," she said. "One guy's registered for SNAP in six different states. I mean, it's one thing after another."

And looking for full accountability, she said all states were asked to submit data on recipients. All Republican-led states complied, along with two run by Democrats. The rest, she said, sued to prevent the data from being disclosed.

"So the problem is you have an extremely corrupt program," said Rollins.

She added that the work to prevent waste and abuse won't stop, "to take that program back to its original intent of helping those who are truly needy in our communities, but not to have a massive welfare benefit where so many people are taking advantage of it that shouldn't be."

Advocacy groups such as the Center for Science in the Public Interest have criticized Rollins’ description of SNAP as “corrupt,” noting that nearly 42 million Americans — about one in eight, including many children, elderly, and disabled people — rely on the program for essential food assistance.

Speaker Johnson told reporters that government benefits programs are designed to help people get through short periods of need, not support them for life.

"SNAP and Medicaid and these other programs were intended to be a temporary safety net to help people to get back on their feet, but they have been abused, abused," he said.

Johnson said there's a bad side to long-term benefit programs.  "And there are some big government advocates, like the Marxists, like the socialists, who want the government to take over everything and supply everything for everybody," he explained.

He added; "Guess what? If the government can give you everything, it can take it away as well, and your freedom is sacrificed. Socialism, don't get me started, has been a great scourge on humanity."

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