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Newark Mayor Begins Food Stamp Challenge

Newark, N.J., Mayor Cory Booker shares his experience eating for $30 per week via Twitter.

A Twitter battle between Newark, N.J., Mayor Cory Booker and a political detractor has the mayor feeding himself solely with food stamps this week. Booker issued the challenge to a self-described veteran and Army wife on Twitter who accused the mayor of wanting to “redistribute wealth.” Booker announced that he would accept this challenge on Nov. 21

Booker, who has $30 to spend on groceries for the week, is sharing his experience on Twitter using #SNAPCHALLENGE. This morning, he expressed thanks to those both spreading the word about the challenge and joining in -- along with his first grocery receipt:

Thanks for sharing this & joining #SNAPChallenge RT @jpmoh: here we go! twitter.com/jpmoh/status/2… — Cory Booker (@CoryBooker) December 4, 2012
He also shared a photo of his food for the week:

 

My #SNAPchallenge food for the week@ City of Newark instagr.am/p/S1QE4cPUUm/ — Cory Booker (@CoryBooker) December 4, 2012
 

Guidelines for the challenge have even been established, as shown by another tweet by Booker this morning:

Watch this quick video to learn the #SNAPchallenge guidelines wayw.re/YyHTSv — Cory Booker (@CoryBooker) December 4, 2012
The mayor's tweet takes followers to a YouTube video, which can also be watched here:



With more than 1 million Twitter followers, Booker is no stranger to Twitter fame. On New Year's Eve 2010, the mayor responded to a tweet from a 65-year-old man who needed his driveway cleared -- Booker volunteered to shovel the snow. Booker told Government Technology that social media sites like Twitter are changing politics. “It changes conversations from private to social,” he said. “If you don’t build up the tool, you really surrender to the space or come off as very robotic. It’s about creating authentic, dynamic feeds.”

Photo via Twitter/@CoryBooker