What is “food security,” really?

For many families, it’s not just a statistic. It’s stretching meals, skipping nutrition, or relying on food banks just to get by. The problem is, the numbers we see paint a simplified picture that doesn’t capture the full struggle. A picture so simplified, our agencies can so easily turn their backs on the people who need us most.

In September 2025, the USDA made the decision to terminate its long-running annual Household Food Security Report, meaning the survey that has tracked hunger in America for nearly three decades will no longer exist. The agency called it “redundant, costly, politicized, and extraneous,” even saying it “does nothing more than fear monger.” But what about the help it actually provided to communities, researchers, and policymakers trying to find solutions?

By shutting this report down, the USDA has left us with more questions than answers. Who decides how food insecurity is measured? Who benefits when the numbers look better (or worse) than they really are? And how do these metrics shape policy decisions that affect millions of households?

Food security isn’t just about whether a family has something on the table tonight. It’s about long-term stability, access to real nutrition, and honesty of the systems tracking it. Transparency is key to real solutions. Because if we can’t trust the data, how can we ever trust the policies built on it?