States are trying to fill the gap as SNAP benefits lapse in November due to the federal government shutdown, and food banks and pantries are preparing for a surge in demand.
Louisiana, for example, said it would roll out benefits in stages, with the elderly and disabled people getting theirs first. And Thursday, Delaware’s governor declared a state of emergency under which “it is ordered that funds be identified and transferred to the Department of Health and Social Services for the continuation of SNAP payments.”
Those payments will be made “on a week-by-week, as-needed basis, currently limited to the month of November.”
Vermont also plans to provide benefits for the first two weeks of November and also has contributed $250,000 to the Vermont Foodbank. New Mexico’s governor announced Wednesday that the state would provide $30 million to ensure continuation of benefits next month.
In addition, Virginia is loading benefits onto SNAP recipients’ EBT cards, said Chloe Green, assistant policy director at the American Public Human Services Association. She added that she knows of about two dozen states that have contributed to food banks.
Stephanie Rubel, founder and executive director of Feeding Michigan Food Pantry in Warren, Michigan, said that to prepare for SNAP cuts "we have been collecting food, finding creative ways to distribute though DoorDash partnerships, recruiting volunteers, and working with community partners to fill the gaps."
Rubel said there has been an increase of food and money donations. "Even more precious, we're seeing communities and businesses step up to fill gaps food pantries will not be able to fill through food drives, handing out hot meals, prepackaged meals, and planning Thanksgiving for other families," she said.
The Trump administration said last week it would not use a SNAP contingency fund, which holds between $5 billion and $6 billion, to fund SNAP in November. The administration said the contingency fund needed to be reserved for potential disaster victims.
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The administration, including Ag Secretary Brooke Rollins, has blamed Democrats for the government shutdown, and Rollins suggested this week that billionaire George Soros could fund SNAP.
Twenty-five states and the District of Columbia have sued over the decision not to use the fund, and a hearing was held in that case Thursday morning in Massachusetts federal court. The judge could issue a decision on the request for a temporary restraining order as soon as Thursday; the New York Times reported that she was skeptical of the administration’s arguments.
“Congress has put money in an emergency fund,” U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani said, according to the newspaper. “It’s hard for me to understand how this isn’t an emergency, when there’s no money, and a lot of people are needing their SNAP benefits.”
If Congress can agree to end the shutdown, recipients could see benefits on their EBT cards as soon as 48 hours later, a former senior federal official said.
“If everybody screams on [Nov. 1] that the cards don't load and Congress says, ‘Okay, now we have a problem. We actually have to fix this,’ and they pass a bill on the second, recipients could see their money on the fourth,” the former official said.
"The [state] SNAP directors are always going to tell you it takes longer because they are concerned about the unknown challenges that could occur while trying to issue benefits in record time," the former official said. "They're the ones that have to make it happen."
The former official said state agencies said the same thing in 2019, when there was a 35-day shutdown, but they were able to get benefits out quickly.
“While the early issuance that occurred during the 35-day shutdown in 2019 was a unique situation, it shows how quickly SNAP partners can react when there is pressure to get benefits to those in need,” the former official said.
Green said the 48-hour timeframe is possible but that some states may need more time.
“It could be as little as 48 hours. It could be a week or more,” she said.
Green added that the task would be made easier if the shutdown were to end and states could administer the program as they normally do. Using the contingency fund now could delay the process of providing benefits as states would then have to calculate partial benefits.
SNAP benefits are about $8 billion monthly, with another $425 million going for state administrative expenses and $245 million for a block grant to Puerto Rico, said David Super, a professor at Georgetown University law school who specializes in administrative law. Super spoke on a webinar hosted by The Hamilton Project Thursday.
Super said the administration’s decision not to use the fund was a purely political one.
He noted that USDA’s shutdown plan released Sept. 30 repeated language from earlier shutdown plans in both the Biden administration and first Trump administration that said SNAP could be funded through the contingency fund.
The end of SNAP benefits “is also a disaster and causes people to be without food, and the prioritizing of hypothetical disaster victims who may or may not have needs during this government shutdown over very real people … is really hard to understand.”
Super also said money in other nutrition programs also could be transferred to make up for any shortfall in SNAP funding
Carrie Stahler, senior manager for government and public affairs at the Vermont Food Bank, told Agri-Pulse her frustration with the current situation is that it’s a “manufactured crisis.”
Similar situations in the past – Stahler mentioned the 2007-2009 Great Recession and the COVID pandemic – “there were a lot of outside forces that were really out of anyone's control.”
But in the current circumstances, “there is a solution for this. There is money in the USDA SNAP contingency fund that they could release tomorrow, and this would solve it. And so it really does feel like using people's lack of ability to meet their basic needs as a political pawn.”
Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., told Agri-Pulse she’d like to pass legislation to continue funding SNAP, but added that a favorable decision for the plaintiffs in the Massachusetts case “would give some reprieve.”
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