A store displays a sign accepting Electronic Benefits Transfer, or EBT, cards for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program purchases for groceries on Oct. 30, 2025 in New York City. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

The U.S. Department of Agriculture will begin next week to block nutrition assistance funding for states led by Democrats that have not provided data on fraud in the program, Secretary Brooke Rollins told President Donald Trump at a Cabinet meeting Tuesday.

USDA sought data from states earlier this year related to their administration of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, benefits, Rollins said Tuesday. She added the data was needed to address fraud that she called “rampant” in the program that helps 42 million people afford groceries.

Most states complied with the request, but 21, mostly run by Democrats, refused, she said. A USDA spokesperson later implied the department was missing data from 22 states.

“As of next week, we have begun and will begin to stop moving federal funds into those states until they comply, and they tell us and allow us to partner with them to root out this fraud and to protect the American taxpayer,” Rollins said.

A USDA spokesperson in an email listed 28 states, plus one territory, from which they said the department has received data.

That would leave the following 22 states, all led by Democratic governors, that have not provided data: Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Washington and Wisconsin. 

The spokesperson provided some additional details of the initiative, including that the department was targeting administrative funds, and that the next step would be a formal warning.

Blue states sought to protect bad actors, including criminals and immigrants in the country without legal status, “over the American taxpayer,” the statement said.

“We have sent Democrat States yet another request for data, and if they fail to comply, they will be provided with formal warning that USDA will pull their administrative funds,” the spokesperson said.

Court records show the department sent the states a new request for data on Nov. 28, and asked for a response within seven days, which would be Friday. 

The letter was reproduced as part of a suit the 22 states have brought against the administration over the request for SNAP recipients’ data.

Leading Dem calls threat illegal

It’s unclear what authority Rollins would have to block funding, which Congress has appropriated.

The federal government pays for all benefits for SNAP, which was formerly known as food stamps. It splits the administrative costs with states.

The USDA spokesperson did not answer a direct question about the legal authority for withholding funds.

Democrats on the U.S. House Agriculture Committee said any effort to block SNAP funding would be illegal.

“Yet again, Trump and Rollins are illegally threatening to withhold federal dollars,” a social media post from an official account of committee Democrats read. “SNAP has one of the lowest fraud rates of any government program, but Trump continues to weaponize hunger.”

The committee’s lead Democrat, Angie Craig of Minnesota, issued her own statement that also accused the administration of “weaponizing hunger” and said Rollins “continues to spew propaganda.”

“Her disregard for the law and willingness to lie through her teeth comes from the very top – the Trump administration is as corrupt as it is lawless, and I will not sit silently as she carries out the president’s campaign against Americans struggling to afford food in part because of this president’s tariffs and disastrous economic policies.”  

SNAP fraud

The data USDA has sought from states includes verification of SNAP recipients’ eligibility, along with a host of personal information such as Social Security numbers.

An early USDA review of data provided by the 28 states and Guam “indicates an estimated average of $24 million dollars per day of federal funds is lost to fraud and errors undetected by States in their administration of SNAP,” the department said in the Nov. 28 letter.

Preventing those losses could save up to $9 billion per year, the letter added.

But the types of fraud cited in some of the public statements from Rollins and the department are rare, existing data show.

A 2023 USDA report showed about 26,000 applications, roughly 0.1% of the households enrolled in SNAP, were referred for an administrative or criminal review.

People in the country illegally have never been authorized to receive SNAP benefits.

“The long-standing data sources indicate that intentional fraud by participants is rare,” Katie Bergh, a senior food assistance policy analyst for the left-leaning think tank Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, said in a November interview.

Trump administration target

SNAP has been a consistent target for cuts during Trump’s second presidency.

The issue was a focal point during the six-week government shutdown, during which the administration reversed itself often but generally resisted calls — from states, advocates, lawmakers and federal judges — to fund food assistance.

Shortly after the government reopened, Rollins in television interviews said she would force all recipients to reapply for benefits, a proposal seen as logistically challenging by program experts.

And the Republican taxes and spending law passed by Congress and signed by Trump earlier this year included new work requirements and other restrictions on SNAP eligibility that advocates say will lead to major drops in benefits. 

The law will also make states pay for some share of benefits and increase the share of administrative costs that states are responsible for, potentially leading some states to cut benefits.

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins speaks during a news conference on Capitol Hill on Oct. 31, 2025, in Washington, D.C. The House speaker's office held the news conference on the 31st day of the government shutdown to discuss food stamp programs running out of funding. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)

U.S. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins’ call for a close reexamination of the 42 million people who receive federal food aid has befuddled advocates and lawmakers, coming mere days after recipients began to see benefits that had been stalled during the government shutdown.

Details remain scant a week after Rollins during an interview on the right-wing Newsmax network first publicly broached the startling idea that every beneficiary would have to reapply for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, often called food stamps.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture, asked for an explanation, referenced existing requirements and suggested more changes in SNAP rules could be in store.

“Secretary Rollins wants to ensure the fraud, waste, and incessant abuse of SNAP ends,” a USDA spokesperson wrote Wednesday. “Rates of fraud were only previously assumed, and President Trump is doing something about it. Using standard recertification processes for households is a part of that work. As well as ongoing analysis of state data, further regulatory work, and improved collaboration with states.”

The 2008 law governing SNAP leaves states responsible for administration. Part of that role includes periodically making sure that the low-income people in the program meet the qualifications for inclusion, but the law allows states to determine how often that occurs.

“It’s not clear what she would be proposing that is different from what is already happening,” said Katie Bergh, a senior policy analyst for food assistance at the left-leaning think tank Center for Budget and Policy Priorities.

One interpretation of Rollins’ comments is that she would remove all 42 million individuals from SNAP’s rolls and ask them to resubmit applications. Bergh said that would lead to people losing money they need for groceries. About 40% of those enrolled in SNAP are children.

“If she’s suggesting that they’re going to somehow redo that process for more than 40 million people who already demonstrated their eligibility and who already have to periodically recertify their eligibility, that would be pretty duplicative and would likely create pretty significant paperwork backlogs that would cause people who are eligible to lose the food assistance that they need,” Bergh said.

Administration critics have suggested that, while the comments are unlikely to lead to policy changes, they introduce even more confusion for a program that was used as a political token during the record government shutdown that ended this month. 

Making people reapply would underscore the Trump administration’s opposition to the nearly $100 billion program, which accounts for 70% of federal nutrition assistance. USDA says the average SNAP household in fiscal 2023 received a monthly benefit of $332, or $177 a person based on the average SNAP household size of 1.9 people.

“Secretary Rollins and the Trump administration have cut food assistance for 42 million Americans multiple times this year,” U.S. House Agriculture ranking member Angie Craig said in a Wednesday statement to States Newsroom. “Now, they’ve once again shown that they do not understand the program.”

What did Rollins say?

In the Nov. 13 interview on Newsmax, Rollins said SNAP was beset by widespread fraud, citing data that 29 mostly Republican-run states submitted to the department. Acquiring data from the 21 other states would give the department a way to wholly remake the program, she said.

“Can you imagine when we get our hands on the blue state data, what we’re going to find?” she said. “It’s going to give us a platform and a trajectory to fundamentally rebuild this program, have everyone reapply for their benefit, make sure that everyone that’s taking a taxpayer-funded benefit through SNAP or food stamps that they literally are vulnerable, and they can’t survive without it. And that’s the next step here.”

In an interview Monday on Fox News, host Maria Bartiromo asked Rollins about the move to have recipients “reapply.”

“Business as usual is over,” Rollins answered in part. “The status quo is no more. We know that the SNAP program is rife with fraud.”

She added that guarding against fraud would help those the program is meant to serve.

The comments touched off widespread confusion about what specifically Rollins meant. 

Asked about the initiative during a Thursday press conference, Craig, a Minnesota Democrat, said she was unclear about how it would work and predicted that Rollins would take credit in the future for the existing low rate of fraud.

“We’re hearing off the record that, you know, maybe people don’t know what the hell they’re talking about,” she said. “In fact, I think they’re trying to take credit for the already very strict standards and the actual low fraud rate in the SNAP program … So we can find no real plan there. Not even sure there’s concepts of a plan there.”

In response to a States Newsroom request this week for details about the initiative, USDA provided the statement that did not answer how the department would proceed or under what authority, but said Rollins was seeking to reduce fraud in the program.

Spokespeople did not respond to follow-up questions, or a request to respond to Craig’s remarks Thursday.

Low fraud rate

Program experts say fraud is not a widespread problem for SNAP.

An April report from the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service found that retailers illegally trafficked about 1.6% of SNAP benefits from fiscal 2015 to 2017.

Fraud by households applying for SNAP, which appear to be the main target of Rollins’ proposal, is even lower. 

According to a USDA report, about 26,000 applications were referred for an administrative review or prosecution on suspicion of fraud. That number accounts for about 0.1% of the 22.7 million households enrolled in the program, according to the Pew Research Center.

“Long-standing data sources indicate that intentional fraud by participants is rare,” Bergh said.

At Thursday’s press conference, Craig called Rollins’ comments “bullsh*t” and “propaganda.”

“Secretary Rollins goes on TV and talks about all the fraud,” she said. “This most effective anti-hunger program in our history has a fraud rate of 1.6%. It’s actually one of the most effective, well-run programs in the country … The bullsh*t this administration is peddling is egregious.”

More targeted reforms

Even experts who advocate for reforms to SNAP say eligibility fraud is not a major issue.

Romina Boccia, director of budget and entitlement policy at the libertarian Cato Institute, said high-net-worth individuals can receive SNAP benefits, but aren’t committing fraud by doing so.

“Some of the issues with SNAP … aren’t because of fraud or abuse, but they are because of bad program rules,” said Boccia.

Boccia also cited an “incentive misalignment” inherent in the state-federal program. States have little incentive to control payments because the federal government funds the program, she said.

Forcing all beneficiaries to reapply would likely reduce the cost of the program by reducing the number of its beneficiaries, including by forcing out higher earners who may not consider the benefits they don’t actually need to be worth the onerous reapplication process, Boccia said. 

But it would also result in a percentage of low earners dropping off the program, as well as many who would be affected by the administrative backlog that would come with processing tens of millions of new applications, she said. 

Shutdown, the big beautiful bill, and confusion

Bergh said Rollins’ comments “add insult to injury” because they come after congressional Republicans and President Donald Trump signed a major tax cuts and spending law that is expected to shrink federal SNAP spending by $187 billion over 10 years. The law added work requirements for many SNAP recipients and shifted some costs to states.

That was followed by the six-week shutdown that saw a dizzying back-and-forth over whether November SNAP benefits would be paid.

“There has been huge amounts of chaos and confusion and disruption for both states and participants in recent weeks, largely due to the shutdown, but also because simultaneously, the administration has required states to implement many of the reconciliation bill’s SNAP cuts,” Bergh said.

Craig, in her statement, also said Rollins’ comments would hurt the people who need the program.

“I am astounded by the secretary’s careless disregard for the hungry seniors and children who can afford to eat because of this program,” she said.

Sara Naomi Bleich, a public health policy professor at Harvard University, said in a phone interview the confusion from Rollins’ comments compounded hardships produced by the Republican reconciliation law, known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.

“Big picture with the One Big Beautiful Bill Act is that there’s basically this tidal wave coming to families that have low income,” Bleich, who worked at USDA during the Obama and Biden administrations, said. “They’re going to lose Medicaid. They’re going to lose SNAP. There could be collateral impacts on the school meals. This is going to be a really hard time for families to navigate.”

Maryland Democratic Gov. Wes Moore spent a few minutes sorting donated food before signing an executive order in late October declaring a state of emergency to allow for distribution of food aid. As the federal government reopens, questions remain about how states will be reimbursed for the costs they incurred. (Photo by Bryan P. Sears/Maryland Matters)

Though Congress ended the record-setting federal government shutdown, many questions remain for states that were already wading through seismic federal changes.

One major uncertainty: whether and how states will be reimbursed for the costs they incurred, as they have been in previous shutdowns. And for the longer term, the shutdown offered a glimpse into the funding challenges facing states. They’ll have to rely more on their own money and staff to keep federal programs going even at a time when many face their own budget problems.

That’s a top concern for the federal food stamp program, known as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP. Amid conflicting federal guidance during the shutdown, states reacted in different ways: Some issued partial benefit payments, others sent aid to food banks to keep people from going hungry.

But even after the government reopening restores SNAP aid, other challenges loom. The major tax and spending law enacted this summer tied SNAP funding to state error rates, which measure the accuracy of benefit payments. Advocates fear the shutdown will increase error rates because of conflicting federal guidance.

Air travel, SNAP benefits, back pay at issue as federal government slowly reopens

“States are really worried,” said Crystal FitzSimons, president of the Food Research & Action Center, a nonprofit working to address poverty-related hunger.

And states have been rushing to inform rural residents, veterans and older adults that they will soon be forced to meet work requirements or lose SNAP benefits. It’s just the first in a wave of cutbacks to the nation’s largest food assistance program required under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act that President Donald Trump signed in July.

FitzSimons said the shutdown highlighted the importance of SNAP and how “untenable” many of the upcoming changes will prove for states. For now, states are working to get benefits to people immediately, and then will focus more on questions of reimbursement and ongoing changes to SNAP.

“The hope is that states will be able to move quickly and then turn their attention to all the changes,” she said.

While public attention has centered on the shutdown chaos in recent weeks, more fundamental changes are occurring outside the spotlight, said Eric Schnurer, founder and president of Public Works, a consulting firm specializing in government performance and efficiency.

“The ground is shifting under their [states’] feet even as this goes on,” he said. “Even if the Trump administration and his policies were to pass on in another three years, there are serious structural changes in the relationship between state and federal government.”

Since taking office, the Trump administration has stripped states and cities of billions of dollars that Congress approved for education, infrastructure and energy projects. And the president’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act mandates deep cuts to social service programs, including Medicaid and food stamps.

Under the law, states will be required to pay a greater share of administering SNAP in the coming years. That requirement, along with eligibility changes, could result in millions of Americans losing benefits.

“I think the public in general got a taste of what that might look like over the past month,” Schnurer said, referencing the shutdown’s first-ever disruption to SNAP benefits.

State-federal strain

The legislation to reopen the government approved by Congress and signed by the president this week says that states shall be reimbursed for expenses “that would have been paid” by the federal government during the shutdown.

“So that sounds promising for states,” said Marcia Howard, executive director of Federal Funds Information for States, which analyzes how federal policymaking impacts states.

But it’s unclear how that language will be interpreted. For example, states that sent money to food banks for emergency food assistance are less likely to be made whole compared with states that sent funds through existing federal programs like SNAP, she said.

California dedicated $80 million in state funds and deployed the National Guard to food banks across the state. But Virginia launched a temporary state-level version of the federal food stamp program.

Previous administrations have been more flexible with federal funds, making it easier for states to receive funding or reimbursement, Howard said.

“This administration is really more holding states’ feet to the fire perhaps than other administrations have. So I think they’ll be less permissive in who and how they reimburse,” she said.

It could take weeks or months before states know the full fallout from the shutdown, especially with food assistance.

“[States] did such different things, and I think there’s going to be a fair bit of back-and-forth: should this be covered? Should this not be covered?” Howard said.

The shutdown and its aftermath underscore the ongoing strain between state and federal governments, said Lisa Parshall, a professor of political science at Daemen University in New York.

Federal uncertainty can cause state leaders to be more cautious about their own budgets — similar to how an economic downturn can decrease consumer spending, she said.

“There’s a delay of services, there’s a diminishment of capacity and partnership, and those things might be harder to quantify when you’re talking about what is the cost of the shutdown,” she said. “But I think those are real costs.”

And the end of the shutdown does not extinguish those tensions.

“In some ways, even though the shutdown is over, things are not going to go back to ‘normal,’” she said.

More changes coming

Aside from spending cuts and new administrative costs, Trump’s July law made major tax code changes poised to cost many states, said William Glasgall, public finance adviser at the Volcker Alliance, a nonprofit that supports public sector workers.

Most states use the federal tax code as a basis for their own income tax structures, so changes at the federal level can trickle down to state tax systems or states can choose a different structure to avoid those changes.

Last month, a Massachusetts budget official said federal tax changes would cost the state $650 million in revenue this budget year.

So even with the government back open, states have to plan for some level of unpredictability, Glasgall said. And the future of entire agencies like the Department of Education remain up in the air, he noted.

“So there’s still a lot of uncertainty, even with this bill,” he said.

On Wednesday, state budget analysts briefed Maryland lawmakers on the $1.4 billion budget gap they could face as they head into the 2026 legislative session.

That figure does not include the fallout from the federal government shutdown, which may not be known for months, according to Maryland Matters.

In late October, Democratic Gov. Wes Moore declared an emergency and directed $10 million in state funds toward food banks and pantries. Earlier this month, he announced $62 million in state funds would be deployed directly to SNAP recipients.

Rhyan Lake, a Moore spokesperson, told Stateline that Maryland expects the federal government to reimburse the state for its SNAP expenditures during the shutdown.

But lawmakers are still gearing up for a hit from major federal changes.

In addition to cuts from Trump’s domestic tax and spending law, Maryland has lost about 15,000 federal jobs, budget officials said. But many federal workers who took buyouts were paid through September. And the shutdown caused a pause in federal employment data, potentially concealing the true impact.

State Sen. James Rosapepe, Democratic chair of the joint Spending Affordability Committee, said he’s worried the state has only seen the beginning of its federally induced fiscal challenges. He also noted that this week’s shutdown-ending legislation only assures the government remains open through January, meaning another shutdown could be just a couple months away.

“We’re less than a year into the administration, and the effects of things they’ve already done don’t seem to have flowed through yet to the data that we have, which leads me to believe that the worst is yet to come,” he said.

Stateline reporter Kevin Hardy can be reached at khardy@stateline.org.

Workers and volunteers help distribute food boxes to those in need at a large-scale drive-through food distribution, in response to the federal government shutdown and SNAP/CalFresh food benefits delays, on Nov. 5, 2025 in City of Industry, California. (Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images)

Payments for November for the nation’s main food assistance program have been delayed during the government shutdown, amid a confusing mess of contradicting guidance from the Trump administration and a flurry of court orders in two cases at every level of the federal judiciary.

The off-and-on freeze of benefits for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, that serves about 42 million people, was among the most consequential effects of the record-setting shutdown. Roughly 1 in 8 Americans use SNAP to help buy groceries.

Lawmakers, advocates and judges all repeatedly called for urgency to restore the program to keep Americans from going hungry. Yet the dizzying back-and-forth continued, often leaving both states and families at a loss.

While the shutdown is likely to end this week, the legal fight continues over the responsibilities of the federal government, which funds SNAP, and the states that administer the program.

Here’s a timeline of events over 42 days since Congress failed to appropriate new funding for the fiscal year that began Oct. 1:

Sept. 30, 2025: On the brink of the current shutdown, the Trump U.S. Department of Agriculture publishes a plan for how its various programs will be affected. It says SNAP benefits will continue to flow from a $6 billion contingency fund during a shutdown.

“Congressional intent is evident that SNAP’s operations should continue since the program has been provided with multi-year contingency funds,” the document reads in part.

States Newsroom discloses the document is later removed from USDA’s website.

Oct. 1: Congress fails to appropriate any money for discretionary government programs. The federal government shuts down. USDA pays October SNAP benefits.

Oct. 10: USDA sends a letter to states telling them not to pay SNAP benefits for November, a reversal from its Sept. 30 plan.

Oct. 24: USDA tells states in a memo that it will not pay November SNAP benefits, even though it held billions in a contingency fund.  

Oct. 28: Democratic states sue USDA in Massachusetts federal court, seeking to force the department to pay for November benefits.

Oct. 30: Nonprofits, religious groups and municipal governments bring a similar suit in Rhode Island federal court. 

Oct. 31: In an initial hearing in the Rhode Island case, U.S. District Chief Judge John J. McConnell Jr. says he is ordering USDA to continue SNAP benefits in November.

In the Massachusetts case, U.S. District Judge Indira Talwani rules that withholding November benefits is illegal, but gives the administration until Nov. 3 to respond.

Nov. 1: McConnell issues a written ruling laying out two options for USDA: pay full benefits for November by Nov. 3 or partial benefits by Nov. 5.

Some SNAP recipients begin to miss benefit payments. The program administers benefits on a rolling basis throughout each month, so more people are affected every day the department is not authorizing benefits.

Nov. 3: In a filing in McConnell’s court, USDA says it will pay about half of November benefits. But it says the administrative difficulties of calculating partial benefits could take weeks or even months.

Nov. 4, just after 11 a.m. Eastern: President Donald Trump posts to Truth Social that SNAP benefits will not be paid until Democrats agree to reopen the government. At the White House press briefing in the afternoon, press secretary Karoline Leavitt walks back that post and says Trump was referring to future benefits.

Nov. 5, late: In a memo to states, USDA corrects a table for the amount of partial benefits households should receive based on income, size of household and other factors. USDA says the table fulfills its duty under McConnell’s Nov. 1 order to pay partial benefits by this date. 

Nov. 6: McConnell orders the USDA to pay full November benefits by the next day. His earlier order was clear that partial benefits must be paid by Nov. 5, he said. Because recipients did not receive their benefits, the government missed that deadline, and it must pay for the whole month, he says. He also notes Trump’s Truth Social post appeared to defy the order.

States, including Wisconsin, Michigan and Oregon, begin to authorize full November benefits. 

Nov. 7, 8:53 a.m. Eastern: The department appeals McConnell’s order the day before to the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Nov. 7, midday: Despite its morning appeal, the USDA issues guidance to states greenlighting full November benefits. A USDA spokesperson says the department must comply with McConnell’s order.

Consistent with the USDA guidance, more states begin to authorize full November benefits.

Nov. 7, evening: The Trump administration asks the U.S. Supreme Court to issue an emergency stay of the 1st Circuit and district court orders that it provide full November benefits that day.

Nov. 7, just before 10 p.m. Eastern: U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson orders an administrative stay while the 1st Circuit appeal is pending. The order temporarily halts the lower courts’ order to provide benefits.

Nov. 8, late: Following the Supreme Court stay, USDA sends states a letter demanding they “immediately undo” any moves to provide full SNAP benefits. The letter threatens to cancel other federal funding for states that don’t comply. 

Nov. 9, late night: A 1st Circuit panel affirms McConnell’s order. The trial judge was within his right to order USDA pay full November benefits, the three-judge panel says.

Nov. 10: The Trump administration continues its Supreme Court appeal, even as the shutdown nears its end and the 1st Circuit has ruled on the appeal.

Talwani issues a restraining order on the Nov. 8 letter asking states to “undo” November benefit payments. At a hearing, she says USDA has created the confusion and that states were acting in line with court orders and the department’s own guidance.

The U.S. Senate approves a bill to reopen the government and fund SNAP, sending the measure to the House. 

Later this week: The U.S. House is expected to clear the Senate bill; Trump is expected to sign it. The Supreme Court could rule on the administration’s request to freeze the lower court orders. 

It is not clear when full November benefits will flow to households.

Text by Jacob Fischler/timeline graphic by Ashley Murray/States Newsroom.

Furloughed federal workers stand in line for hours ahead of a special food distribution by the Capital Area Food Bank and No Limits Outreach Ministries on Barlowe Road in Hyattsville, Maryland, on Tuesday, Oct. 28, 2025. (Photo by Ashley Murray/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — Senators on Friday said they plan to remain in town for the weekend, a sign negotiations may be picking up to approve a stopgap spending measure and end the government shutdown, now at day 38.

A vote on a package of spending bills could come either Saturday or Sunday that would partially fund the government, Senate Majority Leader John Thune told reporters.

“Our members are going to be advised to be available if there’s a need to vote,” Thune said. “We will see what happens and whether or not, over the course of the next couple of days, the Democrats can find a way to reengage again.”

Meanwhile, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer offered a proposal from Democrats to agree to reopen the government if health care tax subsidies are continued for a year. 

As open enrollment begins, people who buy their health insurance through the Affordable Care Act Marketplace are seeing a drastic increase in premium costs.

“We’d like to offer a simple proposal,” the New York Democrat said. “To reopen the government and extend the (Affordable Care Act) tax credits simultaneously.” 

Republicans have maintained that any discussion on extending the health care tax credits set to expire at the end of the year will only happen after government funding resumes. House Speaker Mike Johnson this week said he would not promise a vote on the GOP-controlled House floor regarding the issue. 

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office in September found that if lawmakers permanently extend the enhanced tax credits for certain people who buy their health insurance through the ACA Marketplace, it would cost the government $350 billion over 10 years and increase the number of those with health insurance by 3.8 million.

But it was unclear how much traction Schumer would get. Several Republicans called the proposal a “non-starter,” such as Sen. Mike Rounds of South Dakota. 

Rounds also questioned if the stopgap spending bill that Democrats agreed to support is the House-passed version that would extend government funding only to Nov. 21 or another that would run longer. 

“It’s good that they’re recognizing that we have to open up the government,” Rounds said of Democrats. 

Oklahoma Sen. Markwayne Mullin called the proposal from Democrats “absurd,” and said there was no way senators could negotiate a deal on health care quickly.

He added that Trump also wants to be part of the negotiations on health care.

“Whatever we do as Republicans, we’ve got to really work close with the president,” Mullin said. “The President wants to be involved in this negotiation.”

Separately, senators failed Friday in a 53-43 vote to move forward on a bill from Wisconsin GOP Sen. Ron Johnson to pay federal workers who Friday missed their second paycheck. Georgia’s Democratic Sens. Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock voted with Republicans. Sixty votes were needed.

President Donald Trump on social media said, “The United States Senate should not leave town until they have a Deal to end the Democrat Shutdown. If they can’t reach a Deal, the Republicans should terminate the Filibuster, IMMEDIATELY, and take care of our Great American Workers!”

Flight cutbacks, food aid disruption

The Senate has failed 14 times to move forward on approving a stopgap spending measure to fund the government until Nov. 21. 

As the government shutdown has dragged on for nearly seven weeks, major airports have been hit as they struggle to maintain flight schedules, with air traffic controllers now more than a month without pay.

Meanwhile, federal courts have forced the Trump administration to release billions in emergency funds to provide critical food assistance to 42 million people. On Friday, the U.S. Department of Agriculture said it would issue full November benefits for food assistance in compliance with a court order.

As the debate in Congress goes on, Democrats have refused to back the House-passed version of the GOP stopgap measure over their concerns about the expiration of health care subsidies.

Democrats also want to see federal workers laid off by the Trump administration amid the shutdown rehired. Major wins across the country for Democrats in Tuesday elections in the states bolstered their resolve to reject efforts to end the government shutdown that do not include certain policy wins.  

Historically, lawmakers who have forced shutdowns over policy preferences have not been successful. 

In 2013, the GOP tried to repeal or delay the Affordable Care Act, which did not happen, and in the 2018-2019 shutdown, Trump, in his first term, insisted on additional funding for a border wall. But that shutdown — which set a record exceeded only by the ongoing shutdown — concluded 35 days later with the same amount of money included in the original appropriations bill. 

Thune lament

Thune told reporters Friday that he thought progress was being made on striking a deal to resume government funding, but he said after Democrats’ Thursday caucus meeting, their tune changed. 

“Right now, we’ve got to get the Democrats kind of back engaged,” Thune said.

Following Thursday’s meeting, Democrats remained tight-lipped and did not seem any closer to an internal agreement on how to move forward with resolving the government shutdown.

“I thought we were on a track,” Thune, a South Dakota Republican said. “We’d give them everything they wanted or had asked for.”

Senate Republicans have agreed to allow a floor vote on the Affordable Care Act subsidies and have opened the door to rehiring federal workers, but have not gone further.

“At some point … they have to take yes for an answer, and they were trending in that direction,” Thune said. “And then yesterday, everything kind of, the wheels came off, so to speak, but it’s up to them.”

Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut told reporters Thursday that voters this week made a strong showing in rebuking the Trump administration and that Democrats need to continue their fight amid the government shutdown.

“On Tuesday, all of us in the caucus heard that loud and clear,” Murphy said. “We want to stay together and unified. I think everybody understands the importance of what happened on Tuesday, and wants us to move forward in a way that honors that.”

Bill to pay federal workers

Federal workers going without salaries for more than a month now remains a concern, and Johnson tried to pass his bill through unanimous consent that would send them paychecks. Employees are paid after the end of a shutdown, under the law.

Michigan’s Gary Peters objected to Johnson’s bill over concerns that the Trump administration would not use the funds to pay federal workers, and the measure would not prevent the firing of federal workers. 

Peters pointed to how the Trump administration initially appealed a federal court order that compelled the U.S. Department of Agriculture to pay $9 billion in Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, benefits. 

Peters offered his own bill to set “guardrails” on the president’s authority to ensure that the funds are used to pay federal workers and not moved around. The Trump administration has moved around billions in multi-year research funds within the Defense Department to ensure that troops are paid. 

“He walks over Congress all the time,” Peters said of the president while on the Senate floor. 

Johnson objected to Peters’ bill. He argued that his bill does not expand presidential powers.

“We were very careful that it wouldn’t do that,” Johnson told reporters of his bill.

The American Federation of Government Employees, a union that represents 800,000 federal workers, urged Democrats Friday to support Johnson’s bill.

AFGE National President Everett Kelley said in a letter to senators Friday that with Thanksgiving in less than three weeks, Congress needs to come to an agreement on funding the government. 

“Every missed paycheck deepens the financial hole in which federal workers and their families find themselves,” Kelley said. “By the time Congress reaches a compromise, the damage will have been done to their bank accounts, their credit ratings, their health, and their dignity.”

Volunteers with the Capital Area Food Bank distribute items to furloughed federal workers in partnership with No Limits Outreach Ministries in Hyattsville, Maryland, on Oct. 28, 2025. (Photo by Ashley Murray/States Newsroom)

This report has been updated.

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Senate Tuesday failed for the 14th time to advance a stopgap spending bill to fund the government, as the ongoing shutdown hit 35 days and is now tied with the shutdown of 2018-2019 as the longest ever.

The 54-44 vote was nearly identical to the previous 13 votes, as Republicans and Democrats remained unwilling to change positions. The legislation extending funding to Nov. 21 needed at least 60 votes to advance, per the Senate’s legislative filibuster. 

Even though the upper chamber has been unable to pass a stopgap spending measure for more than a month, Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., told reporters Tuesday that he believes senators are “making progress.” 

He floated keeping the Senate in session next week. The chamber is scheduled to be in recess for the Veterans Day holiday. 

“We’ll think through that as the week progresses, but I guess my hope would be we’ll make some progress,” he said.

Thune added that any stopgap spending bill will need to be extended past Nov. 21, “because we’re almost up against the November deadline right now.”

Duffy warns of flight ‘chaos’ due to staff shortages

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy warned during a Tuesday press conference at the Department of Transportation that if the government shutdown continues into next week, it would lead to “chaos” and certain airspace would need to be closed due to a shortage of air traffic controllers who have continued to work amid the shutdown.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., said at a separate press conference at the Capitol that he would bring the House back to vote on a stopgap spending measure if the Senate extends the funding date.

“If the Senate passes something, of course we’ll come back,” Johnson said. “We’re running out of (the) clock.”

Johnson said he is “not a fan” of extending the bill to December and would prefer a January deadline. 

He said extending a stopgap funding bill “into January makes sense, but we got to, obviously, build consensus around that.” 

Senators at odds

On Tuesday’s Senate vote, Nevada Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto and Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman, both Democrats, and Maine independent Sen. Angus King voted with Republicans to advance the legislation. Kentucky GOP Sen. Rand Paul voted no.

Senate Democrats have refused to support the House-passed GOP measure over concerns about the expiration of health care tax subsidies. As open enrollment begins, people who buy their health insurance through the Affordable Care Act Marketplace are seeing a drastic spike in premium costs. 

Republicans have maintained that any negotiations on health care must occur after Democrats agree to fund the government. 

The Trump administration has also tried to pressure Democrats to accept the House stopgap spending measure by instructing the U.S. Department of Agriculture to not tap into its contingency fund to provide critical food assistance to 42 million Americans. 

SNAP fight

Two federal courts have found the Trump administration acted unlawfully in holding back those benefits, and on Monday USDA announced it would partially release Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, benefits. 

However, President Donald Trump Tuesday morning wrote on his social media platform that SNAP benefits would only be released when Democrats vote to reopen the government, a move that would likely violate the two court orders.

“SNAP BENEFITS, which increased by Billions and Billions of Dollars (MANY FOLD!) during Crooked Joe Biden’s disastrous term in office (Due to the fact that they were haphazardly ‘handed’ to anyone for the asking, as opposed to just those in need, which is the purpose of SNAP!), will be given only when the Radical Left Democrats open up government, which they can easily do, and not before!,” he wrote.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said during a Tuesday briefing that the president’s social media post did not refer to the court order, but was referring to future SNAP payments.

“The president doesn’t want to tap into this (contingency) fund in the future and that’s what he was referring to,” she said.

‘Republican health care crisis’ 

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York stood firm in his party’s demands over extending health care tax credits in order to back a stopgap spending bill during a Tuesday press conference at the Capitol.

“We want to reopen the government — we want to find a bipartisan path forward toward enacting a spending agreement that actually makes life better for the American people, that lowers costs for the American people, as opposed to the Trump economy where things are getting more expensive by the day,” Jeffries said. 

“And, of course, we have to decisively address the Republican health care crisis that is crushing the American people all across the land.” 

He noted that Republicans’ refusal to extend the enhanced Affordable Care Act tax credits would result in “tens of millions of Americans experiencing dramatically increased premiums, co-pays and deductibles.” 

An analysis by KFF shows that those enrollees in the Affordable Care Act marketplace who currently receive a tax credit are likely to see their monthly premium payments more than double by about 114% on average.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said the spike in health care premiums will cause some people to choose to forgo health care insurance.

“It’s a five-alarm health care emergency,” Schumer said. 

Johnson’s January CR rationale 

Meanwhile, Johnson said at his press conference that “a lot of people around here have PTSD about Christmas omnibus spending bills,” when speaking out against a December extension of the stopgap spending bill. 

GOP leaders have sought to do away with the practice of bundling at the end of the year the final versions of the dozen annual government funding bills into what’s known as an omnibus package. 

“We don’t want to do that. It gets too close, and we don’t want to have that risk,” Johnson said. “We’re not doing that.” 

However, it’s unclear how long the new stopgap spending bill will extend. Thune, during a Tuesday press conference, said a year-long continuing resolution, or CR, was not on the table. 

“There’s a conversation around what that next deadline would be,” Thune said, adding that there is not an agreement yet.

A store displays a sign accepting Electronic Benefits Transfer, or EBT, cards for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program purchases for groceries on Oct. 30, 2025 in New York City. (Photo by Spencer Platt/Getty Images)

President Donald Trump backtracked Tuesday on a pledge by his administration in court filings to partially fund November food assistance during the government shutdown, posting on social media that benefits “will be given only when the Radical Left Democrats open up government, which they can easily do, and not before!” 

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said later Tuesday that Trump was referring to future uses of a food assistance contingency fund and that the administration was complying with the court order, though that description did not match Trump’s post.

Trump’s declaration appeared to have little effect on the federal court case over food aid. The U.S. Department of Agriculture wrote in a court filing late Tuesday it would continue with a plan to provide partial November payments. 

The benefits usually are provided to some 42 million Americans and, at the moment, are shut off pending the partial payments. 

Before Trump’s post Tuesday, a coalition of cities and nonprofits suing the USDA said the delayed partial payments were not enough.

The coalition that filed suit, led by the Rhode Island State Council of Churches, just prior to Trump’s social media post Tuesday asked a Rhode Island federal court to compel the government to pay full benefits. 

The USDA’s promise Monday that it would provide partial payments to households who use the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, from a roughly $4.5 billion contingency fund, was an insufficient response to a court order, the groups said.

USDA officials said Monday they could not complete partial payments for November benefits by Chief District Court Judge John J. McConnell Jr.’s deadline of Wednesday, and warned it could take several months for beneficiaries to receive the funding because of the administrative difficulties of recalculating and processing partial benefits.

The groups suing said Tuesday that if paying partial benefits created such delays, McConnell should force the government to pay full benefits instead.

“If Defendants cannot comply with the Court’s command to expeditiously resolve the hurdles to making ‘timely’ partial payments, then that is a problem of their own making,” the groups wrote. 

“They chose—unlawfully and contrary to past agency precedent and guidance—to withhold all funding for SNAP,” they continued. “That this unlawful decision may have made it impossible for them to clear the administrative hurdles now is no excuse. They still have a straightforward path to meeting the directives in the Court’s order.”

The department could legally and relatively easily tap into a separate child nutrition program account that holds $23 billion, the groups said. That would more than cover the $9 billion needed for a month of SNAP benefits, they said. 

McConnell ordered the government to respond to the challengers’ motion, and set a hearing on the issue for Thursday afternoon. 

Trump changes course

Within an hour of the groups’ filing, Trump, who had said he was eager to restore SNAP benefits, responded on social media with his defiant message that he would only release any SNAP funding once Democrats in Congress agreed to end the government shutdown that began Oct. 1.

Trump had said Friday he told government lawyers to seek clarification on how the government could legally send out benefits during the shutdown, adding he did not want Americans to go hungry.

“If we are given the appropriate legal direction by the Court, it will BE MY HONOR to provide the funding,” he wrote Oct. 31, following an oral order by McConnell.

McConnell issued a written order the next day that benefits be provided either in full by Monday or partially by Wednesday. 

The USDA responded Monday that it would provide partial benefits from the contingency fund that held about half of a month’s worth of benefits, but that the process could take weeks or even months for states to recalibrate the amount each beneficiary would receive and to process those payments.

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins echoed that commitment just before the challengers submitted their motion to compel full payments.

“This morning, @USDA sent SNAP guidance to States,” Rollins wrote on X. “My team stands by to offer immediate technical assistance. This will be a cumbersome process, including revised eligibility systems, State notification procedures, and ultimately, delayed benefits for weeks, but we will help States navigate those challenges.”

Spokespeople for the USDA did not return messages seeking an explanation for the course change Tuesday morning.

At the White House press briefing Tuesday afternoon, Leavitt said she had just spoken with Trump and sought to clarify his statement.

“We are digging into a contingency fund,” she said. “The president doesn’t want to tap into this fund in the future and that’s what he was referring to.” 

Skye Perryman, the president and CEO of Democracy Forward, an advocacy group representing the groups challenging the administration, said in a Tuesday post to social media that Trump’s post was “immoral” and that the group would make use of it.

“See you in court,” Perryman said.

Shutdown lingers

The dispute over SNAP benefits stems from the lapse in government funding that began when Congress failed to appropriate money for federal programs by the start of the fiscal year on Oct. 1.

The USDA said in a plan published just ahead of the shutdown — and since deleted — that it would use the contingency fund, which then held $6 billion, to cover SNAP benefits if needed.

But the department reversed itself within weeks, telling states in an Oct. 10 letter that benefits would not be paid in November if the government remained shut down on the first of the month.

Members of each party have blamed the other for the lack of SNAP benefits. 

Democrats have demanded the administration reshuffle funds to cover the program, as it has with other federal funding during the shutdown, while Republicans have called on Democrats to approve a stopgap spending bill to reopen the government at fiscal 2025 spending levels.

Democrats in Congress have blocked Republicans’ “clean” continuing resolution to reopen the government in a bid to force negotiations on expiring tax credits for people who buy insurance on the Affordable Care Act marketplace.

As of Tuesday, the parties showed little sign of softening their positions.

Ariana Figueroa contributed to this report.

A sign in a convenience store along Barlowe Road in Hyattsville, Maryland, on Tuesday, Oct. 28, 2025, advertises that it accepts SNAP benefits. (Photo by Ashley Murray/States Newsroom)

This report has been updated.

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Department of Agriculture will pay about half of November benefits for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, though benefits could take months to flow to recipients, the department said Monday in a brief to a federal court in Rhode Island.

A four-page report from the USDA answered U.S. District Chief Judge John J. McConnell Jr.’s order that President Donald Trump’s administration pay at least a portion of benefits to the 42 million people who receive assistance through the program by the end of Wednesday, despite the government shutdown.

The USDA action does not address what would happen if the shutdown stretches beyond November.

Leading Democrats in Congress blasted the administration’s decision to pay only part of the month’s benefits, saying Trump was willfully denying food assistance to needy Americans.  “Providing partial benefits is not enough, is not compliant with the law, and it’s particularly cruel of Trump with the Thanksgiving season around the corner,” said Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer of New York. 

McConnell on Saturday laid out two options for the administration: pay for partial benefits by the end of Wednesday through a contingency fund which currently has about $4.65 billion available, or pay for a full month of benefits by tapping other reserve sources such as the child nutrition program by the end of Monday. 

USDA opted to use the contingency fund, giving the department until the end of Wednesday to pay out benefits. 

But a declaration from Patrick A. Penn, USDA’s deputy under secretary for food, nutrition and consumer services, said the administrative hurdles in calculating and delivering a half-month’s portion of benefits could take “anywhere from a few weeks to up to several months.”

The department was complying with McConnell’s order by starting the process of resuming payments Monday, according to the status report signed by U.S. Justice Department officials.

USDA “will fulfill its obligation to expend the full amount of SNAP contingency funds today by generating the table required for States to calculate the benefits available for each eligible household in that State,” they said. “USDA will therefore have made the necessary funds available and have authorized the States to begin disbursements once the table is issued.”

Delayed SNAP benefits in shutdown

McConnell’s order acknowledged that calculating reduced benefits would take the government some time, which he explained was why he gave USDA until Wednesday if the department chose that path.

But Penn said Monday that was not nearly enough time, in part due to some states’ outdated systems for processing benefits.

The federal government would provide states with updated tables for benefits at the partial funding level by Monday, he said. States will then need to send updated files to the vendors that process benefits and add them to beneficiaries’ debit-like EBT cards to be spent on groceries.

Monday marked the 34th day of the federal government shutdown, which began Oct. 1 when Congress failed to appropriate money for federal programs or pass a stopgap spending bill. 

The U.S. Senate was expected to hold another procedural vote to move forward the House-passed GOP stopgap bill that would fund the government at fiscal 2025 levels until Nov. 21. 

Democrats have voted against that measure in a bid to force negotiations on expiring tax credits for people who buy health insurance on the Affordable Care Act marketplace.

On Tuesday, the funding lapse will tie for the longest shutdown in history, which took place between 2018 and 2019. 

Contingency fund dispute

Leading up to the end of October, the administration had warned it could not pay SNAP benefits for this month amid the shutdown, saying it was legally forbidden from using the contingency fund that was supposed to be for natural disasters and similar emergencies.

But two federal judges ruled Oct. 31 that USDA not only could use the fund, but was obligated to in order to keep SNAP benefits flowing.

Saturday marked the first lapse in benefit payments in the modern history of the program that dates to part of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s War on Poverty agenda.

Lawmakers, advocates and SNAP experts said users of the program would see a delay in November benefits as the administration worked to restart it.

The administration’s insistence it could not use its contingency fund, originally appropriated by Congress at $6 billion, was a reversal from a Sept. 30 USDA plan on how to operate in a shutdown, which explicitly called for use of the fund to keep issuing benefits.

A month of SNAP benefits costs the federal government about $9 billion.

While USDA would not use the contingency fund to pay for regular benefits, it did spend about $750 million of the original $6 billion for other uses in October, according to a Monday declaration to the court by Penn.

The department spent about $450 million for state administrative expenses and $300 million for block grants to Puerto Rico and American Samoa, Penn wrote.

The department would again allocate $450 million for administrative expenses in November, and $150 million for the block grants to territories, he added.

That left $4.65 billion available for November benefits, Penn wrote. 

No use of child nutrition funds

Penn also explained USDA’s decision not to use a fund for a child nutrition program to cover shortfall for SNAP benefits.

The administration wanted to keep that fund fully stocked, he said.

“Child Nutrition Program funds are not a contingency fund for SNAP,” he said. “Using billions of dollars from Child Nutrition for SNAP would leave an unprecedented gap in Child Nutrition funding that Congress has never had to fill with annual appropriations, and USDA cannot predict what Congress will do under these circumstances.” 

The child nutrition program funds school meals, summer meals for children and summer EBT benefits for low-income families with children. The school lunch program alone serves about 29 million children per day, Penn said.

Democrats call USDA plan ‘not acceptable’

Democrats expressed dismay that the administration opted not to fully fund November benefits.

“Just now paying the bare minimum to partially fund SNAP is not enough, and it is not acceptable,” Sen. Patty Murray of Washington state wrote in a social media post Monday.

“Trump should immediately work to fully fund benefits under the law,” added Murray, who serves as the top Democrat on the Senate Appropriations Committee. 

Rep. Rosa DeLauro, ranking member of the House Appropriations panel, said “this was entirely avoidable,” noting that Trump “chose to hold hungry children, seniors, and veterans hostage in a selfish and cruel attempt to gain political advantage.” 

“Now, only partial benefits will be sent out late, and families will go hungry, while this administration continues to host lavish parties for their billionaire donors and political allies,” the Connecticut Democrat said.

She added that “we are in this situation because of a lack of political will on the part of the Trump administration” and urged USDA “to put politics aside and use the money they have available to ensure families do not go hungry.”

Speaker Johnson defends Trump

At a press conference Monday, U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson continued to defend Trump’s handling of the SNAP payments.

The president is “desperate for SNAP benefits to flow to the American citizens who desperately rely upon it,” Johnson said.

The Louisiana Republican echoed Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins’ Friday claim that sought to justify her agency’s refusal to tap into the contingency fund to pay for SNAP. 

“The way we always understood it was: The contingency fund could not be used legally if the underlying fund was suspended,” Johnson said. 

He blamed congressional Democrats for voting against the stopgap spending bill and noted that two judges, McConnell and Indira Talwani in Massachusetts federal court, who separately ordered payments resume, were appointed by Democratic former President Barack Obama.

Talwani ruled Friday that the USDA plan to pause SNAP was illegal — but gave the Trump administration until Monday to respond to her finding before she decides on a motion to force the benefits be paid despite the ongoing government shutdown.

Johnson also acknowledged the complex logistics of releasing the money to states. 

“So, it’s not as easy as hitting go send on a computer — you gotta go through and recalculate partial payments to the 42 million recipients of the program,” Johnson said. “That puts a huge burden on states and on the feds to try to figure that out in short order.”

A produce cooler at Willy Street Co-op in Madison, Wisconsin. FoodShare funding from the federal government will stop Nov. 1 if the federal government shutdown continues. (Photo by Erik Gunn/Wisconsin Examiner)

Milwaukee elected leaders gathered outside the county’s Marcia P. Coggs Health and Human Services Building on Friday, providing updates to residents and praising the community’s resilience amidst the ongoing federal government shutdown. 

“Milwaukee County is strong and resilient, but the health and wellbeing of our residents and families should never be casualties of political fights in Washington,” said Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley. “Until this federal shutdown ends, we will do what we always do: look out for our neighbors and step up to help in times of need. I’m grateful to our community partners and encourage every resident who is able to join us in caring for our community.”  

Beginning Saturday Nov. 1, people across the state who depend on the Wisconsin FoodShare assistance program will be at risk of losing that aid, due to the discontinuation of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) as a result of the government shutdown.

A Milwaukee County press release said that over 230,000 local residents will be left without food assistance “with no clear end in sight”. The release also noted that if the shutdown continues into December, then Section 8 housing benefits will also be on the chopping block. This aspect of the shutdown could lead the Milwaukee County Department of Health and Human Services to not pay federally mandated portions of rent costs, placing a strain on tenants and small-scale landlords. 

“I have been clear as day: no one wins in a shutdown,” said U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin. “Republicans and Donald Trump need to finally come to the table to end this shutdown and lower health care costs for families…Wisconsin families just want to live a comfortable life where they can put food on the table, afford their health care and monthly bills, and not have Washington politics butting into their life. While Wisconsin’s House Republicans are on day 42 of a paid vacation and President Trump is just coming home from another foreign trip, Wisconsinites are going to wake up tomorrow to find their health care premiums are skyrocketing and food assistance is being taken from them. Enough is enough.”

 

Food drive donations are being accepted at locations across the county including:

• Milwaukee City Hall (200 E. Wells St)
• Milwaukee County Courthouse (901 N. 9th St)
• Zeidler Municipal Building (841 N. Broadway)
• Marcia P. Coggs Health & Human Services Center (1230 W. Cherry St)
• Hillview (1615 S. 22nd Street)
• Fiserv Forum (1111 Vel R. Phillips Avenue)
• All Milwaukee public schools 
• All Milwaukee library branches
• The Mason Temple Church (6058 N. 35th St)
  

Residents can also donate to NourishMKE or Feeding America if they’d like to provide financial assistance to programs. While republicans blame the shutdown on democrats wanting to protect people living in the country without legal documentation, democrats say they’re attempting to preserve Affordable Healthcare Act health insurance subsidies which, if allowed to expire, would lead to inflated health costs for people across the country, including some 310,000 Wisconsinites, many of whom would see their insurance payments rise between 45 and 800%.

“This hunger crisis did not need to happen,” said Congresswoman Gwen Moore in a statement. “The Trump Administration is purposefully withholding $5 billion in contingency funding, so they can inflict maximum pain and hardship on the American people…Unlike what Republicans claim, this won’t only hurt my district, but their constituents throughout Wisconsin, including rural areas. SNAP is a lifeline, not a political weapon.” 

Milwaukee Mayor Cavalier Johnson said he was grateful that neighbors were uniting “so that hunger does not rule the day.” Johnson said, however that, “donations and food drives are a temporary fix. We need resolution to this shutdown so that the federal government can resume the important work we ask of it.”

As the government shutdown continues, federal employees who work in Milwaukee County are also feeling the pressure. Many have been furloughed from their jobs, or are working without pay. At Mitchell International Airport, federal air traffic and security workers are not getting paid, as are Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) workers. The Veteran Affairs Regional Benefits Office in Milwaukee is closed due to furloughed employees. 

 

A shopper who receives SNAP benefits slides an EBT card at a checkout counter in a Washington, D.C., grocery store in December 2024. (Photo by U.S. Department of Agriculture)

WASHINGTON — A federal judge on Saturday issued a written order saying there is “no question” that U.S. Department of Agriculture contingency funds must be used to provide food assistance for 42 million Americans during the government shutdown.

Rhode Island U.S. District Court Chief Judge John J. McConnell Jr. had said during a Friday hearing he was granting a temporary restraining order sought by cities and nonprofit groups. McConnell ordered that the government distribute payments of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, benefits. 

Because Congress is locked in a stalemate over a stopgap spending bill and did not appropriate money for the fiscal year that began Oct. 1, Trump administration officials had said the program could not provide SNAP benefits beyond Saturday.

In response to McConnell, President Donald Trump in a social media post later Friday said administration lawyers believed the funds could not legally be paid and that he needed clarification about how to distribute SNAP benefits. 

“I do not want Americans to go hungry just because the Radical Democrats refuse to do the right thing and REOPEN THE GOVERNMENT,” Trump said.  “If we are given the appropriate legal direction by the Court, it will BE MY HONOR to provide the funding …”

Government lawyers also filed a brief in the Rhode Island case asking McConnell to clarify how his order could legally be carried out, noting it was delivered orally and there was no written transcript.

In his Saturday order, McConnell, who was appointed by former President Barack Obama, quoted Trump and said, “So, here’s the ORDER and here’s the legal direction from the Court.”

In a footnote, the McConnell order also said: “The Court greatly appreciates the President’s quick and definitive response to this Court’s Order and his desire to provide the necessary SNAP funding.”

McConnell said it was likely that the plaintiffs would succeed in their case. He noted that Congress appropriated funds for SNAP in an annual spending bill, and lawmakers directed that $3 billion should be put in reserve through Sept. 30, 2026. Another $3 billion in a later bill was put aside until Sept. 30, 2027.

 “There is no question that the congressionally approved contingency funds must be used now because of the shutdown; in fact, the President during his first term issued guidance indicating that these contingency funds are available if SNAP funds lapse due to a government shutdown,” McConnell said.

Two options in written order

Because the $6 billion is not enough to cover the estimated $9 billion cost of November benefits, government lawyers have said it would be difficult to determine reduced benefits, McConnell said. 

He said USDA then should “within its discretion, find the additional funds necessary” to fund the full $9 billion, suggesting use of $23 billion in a fund for state child nutrition programs.

If the government chooses to make full SNAP payments for November, it must do so by the end of the day Monday, he said. If instead the government makes a partial payment of SNAP funds, then it must pay out all the $6 billion in contingency funds by Wednesday, he said.

He asked the government to update him by noon Monday how it was complying with the order.

In a separate case, a federal judge in Boston also ruled Friday that the USDA plan to pause SNAP was illegal — but gave the Trump administration until Monday to respond to her finding before she decides on a motion to force the benefits be paid despite the ongoing government shutdown.

No matter what happens on Monday, experts and a key member of Congress have said that some SNAP recipients still may see delays in their benefits because changes in administration from the federal government to states to vendors take time. In states, SNAP benefits are loaded onto cards on varying dates, but the Saturday cutoff would have been effective for November benefits.

A volunteer stocks produce at the Independence Food Basket, a food pantry operated by the Community Access Center in Independence, Kan. Like other food pantries across the country, the organization has been providing food assistance to more families even before a disruption to the federal food stamp program. (Photo by Kevin Hardy/Stateline)

INDEPENDENCE, Kan. — Just a few years ago, the Community Access Center’s food pantry here served up to 250 families per month. But that figure has skyrocketed as the price of groceries has pinched more and more families.

Now, the small food pantry serves about 450 families a month in this community of about 8,500 people. Serving that growing number has become increasingly difficult with the high cost of food, cuts in federal aid — and an unprecedented disruption in the nation’s largest food assistance program looming.

Chris Mitchell, who leads the nonprofit that operates the Independence Food Basket and provides other services, said the amount the organization spends on food to supplement donated items increased from $1,700 per month in 2018 to $4,000 per month now.

“And that’s getting it from the food bank without taxes,” he said.

Like other providers across the country, the Independence Food Basket is bracing for a spike in demand when an estimated 42 million people are expected to lose access to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, commonly known as SNAP. Monthly benefits will not be provided beginning Saturday because of the ongoing federal government shutdown.

The unparalleled stress of a SNAP disruption on food pantries and the food banks that collect, warehouse and distribute food comes at a time when they were already stretched thin. High grocery prices have pushed more Americans to look to food banks for help. But organizations providing food relief have lost more than $1 billion in federal aid and are bracing for the impacts of legislation that will permanently limit the reach of SNAP.

Food banks now are asking local governments and donors to step in as they prepare for long lines. Many operations have increased orders ahead of the expected SNAP chaos, though some food pantries say they may have to ration food if supplies dwindle too quickly.

“You’d have to be living under a rock somewhere to not know that the prices of groceries went up and stayed up,” Mitchell said. “Now, you’re going to take away the means that people in poverty can afford food.”

The rising price of food has driven up not just visits to pantries, but also costs for the charitable food system in recent years.

Social service providers also are bracing for the impact of permanent changes to food stamps and other social services enacted in President Donald Trump’s major tax and spending law signed in July. The first in a wave of cutbacks to SNAP ended exemptions from work requirements for older adults, homeless people, veterans and some rural residents, likely pushing millions out of the food stamp program.

The administration also has pulled direct aid to food banks.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture in March nixed more than $1 billion from two programs that helped food banks and school meal programs buy local foods including fruits, vegetables and proteins.

Also this spring, the administration abruptly cut $500 million from a program that sends domestically produced meat, dairy, eggs and produce to food banks. The items that were delivered through The Emergency Food Assistance Program were some of the healthiest, most expensive items organizations distribute, ProPublica reported.

In Missouri alone, that move canceled 124 scheduled deliveries to food banks, including 146,400 pounds of cheese, 433,070 pounds of canned and frozen chicken and 1.2 million eggs.

“Food banks have been operating on fumes since the pandemic,” said Gina Plata-Nino, interim SNAP director at the Food Research & Action Center, a national nonprofit working to address poverty-related hunger. “As much as we love the food banks and the superhero work that they’re doing, they can only do so much.”

Already rising demand

Plata-Nino said food banks and food pantries were intended as emergency food aid, but have become “a way of life” for many who struggle to afford groceries.

A disruption in SNAP benefits will cause millions to make impossible decisions about how to stretch their limited dollars, Plata-Nino said. She noted that the majority of SNAP recipients make less than $1,100 per month. (The liberal-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities estimates the average SNAP benefit this fiscal year is about $188 per month per person.)

“People are already making really difficult choices,” she said, “and I hate to call it a choice, because it’s not a choice when you don’t have one.”

In Texas, the San Antonio Food Bank has been responding to a surge in need from furloughed federal workers. With major Defense Department operations across the area, San Antonio is home to the largest number of federal employees in Texas.

Eric Cooper, the food bank’s president and chief executive officer, estimates it will serve about 50,000 more people who have gone without paychecks this month. Each year, the food bank serves about 577,000 people across 29 counties.

He recalled one furloughed U.S. Social Security Administration employee who recently visited for the first time. Though she weathered previous shutdowns, she now takes care of her grandchildren.

“She’s like, ‘Hey, I showed up to get food because I don’t know if I’m going to get paid, and I can’t let my grandbabies go hungry,’” Cooper said.

Given the disruption to SNAP, Cooper said the food bank has been gearing up to not only increase inventory but also manage limited supplies and heightened emotions among the public.

“Should the demand start to outpace our supply, we will start to ration,” he said. “Rather than giving a week’s worth of food or two weeks’ worth of food, we’re going to be giving less.”

Generally, the need for free food spikes during times of natural disasters or recessions, said Michelle Ness, executive director of PRISM, a nonprofit providing housing and food assistance in suburban Minneapolis.

But Minnesota food shelves, known as food pantries in other parts of the country, have seen a 150% increase in visits since the pandemic, she said.

“This is during nonemergency times, nondisaster times — needs are going way up,” she said. “Right now, food shelves are at just about the max capacity we can handle.”

To meet the projected increase in demand because of the SNAP disruption, Ness said her organization’s food shelf is considering launching a sort of express lane that would allow people to quickly pick up prepackaged boxes of food. She hopes donors will increase their giving to avoid rationing food.

“If anything, I would like to be able to give out more food, because people will have greater needs without getting SNAP benefits,” she said. “That’s a lot of food that they’re not going to have to fill their refrigerator and cupboards.”

A daily necessity

While nonprofits happily take donated food items, much of the stock is purchased. And that doesn’t come cheap — even with discounts for purchasing foods in bulk from nonprofit food banks.

The Food Group, a Minneapolis food bank that supplies PRISM and other operators, has had to raise its prices and cut back on certain expensive items — including eggs, said Executive Director Sophia Lenarz-Coy.

In the past year, The Food Group has raised its wholesale prices of spaghetti by 26%. Jasmine rice has gone up 6%, and dry potatoes have increased 11%. Between 2022 and 2025, a case of frozen ground beef has increased from just under $50 to $63.08 — a 28% spike. Cases of margarine have risen 39% over that time, and diced tomatoes have gone up 23%.

“I think it’s really hard to overstate just how grocery prices have changed in the last three years,” said Lenarz-Coy.

While higher earners can make adjustments in their monthly budgets, she noted that food is often the only flexible item in lower-income household budgets.

“Housing costs, how much you need to pay for transportation or medical costs or day care — those are all fixed costs,” she said. “The place where people can flex is on food, but those flexes just don’t get you as much as they used to.”

Back in southeast Kansas, Mitchell, of the Community Access Center, has come to appreciate the urgency of hunger.

Mitchell previously worked in homeless services. Oftentimes, people can get by temporarily staying with friends and families, but food is a constant, daily need, he noted.

“It’s like going without liquid,” he said. “You just don’t last very long without it. And that’s probably what hurts me the most about this cutoff.”

The looming SNAP disruption has him bracing for panic among those who rely on the pantry.

The per capita annual income in Independence is just under $30,000, and about a quarter of all children live in poverty, according to U.S. Census Bureau figures.

To meet surging demand, Mitchell is considering further limiting the pantry’s already rationed offerings, whether families have one person or six in the household.

“That kills my heart,” he said. “But that’s so everybody gets some. … I’ve got this many people, and I’ve got to make sure that I can put something in each hand.”

Located inside a beige cinderblock building, the one-room food pantry is set up like a grocery store, with freezers for meats, refrigerators for fresh veggies and shopping carts for browsing.

Mitchell is proud to offer that kind of choice for people, which makes the process more dignified and reduces the likelihood that food goes to waste.

But a rush of visits next week — and concerns about hoarding and public safety — may force the nonprofit to reinstate its pandemic-era practice of handing out prepackaged boxes outdoors.

“It feels like going backwards,” Mitchell said.

Stateline reporter Kevin Hardy can be reached at khardy@stateline.org.

Produce at a Virginia grocery store in 2011. (Photo by Lance Cheung/U.S. Department of Agriculture)

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Department of Agriculture said in a memo Friday the agency’s contingency fund cannot legally be used to provide food assistance benefits for more than 42 million people in November, as the government shutdown drags on.

The position is a reversal from the department’s earlier stance, according to a since-deleted copy of the USDA’s Sept. 30 shutdown plan that said the department would use its multi-year contingency fund to continue paying Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, benefits during the ongoing shutdown. 

SNAP has about $6 billion in the contingency fund — short of the roughly $9 billion needed to cover a full month of the program, putting November benefits in jeopardy. 

Because of a stalemate in Congress over a stopgap spending bill, the government shut down on Oct. 1 without new SNAP funding enacted.

The memo, which was first reported by Axios on Friday, said states would not be reimbursed if they use their own funds to cover the cost of the benefits.

“There is no provision or allowance under current law for States to cover the cost of benefits and be reimbursed,” the memo says, while also noting that “the best way for SNAP to continue is for the shutdown to end.”

Discrepancy with shutdown plan

The memo also says the contingency fund is meant for natural disasters and similar emergencies, not for a lack of appropriations.

But USDA’s Sept. 30 contingency plan contradicts that and appears to greenlight the use of SNAP’s contingency fund during a lapse in funding.

“Congressional intent is evident that SNAP’s operations should continue since the program has been provided with multi-year contingency funds that can be used for State Administrative Expenses to ensure that the State can also continue operations during a Federal Government shutdown,” according to the plan. “These multi-year contingency funds are also available to fund participant benefits in the event that a lapse occurs in the middle of the fiscal year.”

USDA’s contingency plan is no longer online, but is accessible through an internet archive.

After providing States Newsroom with the memo Friday afternoon, USDA did not immediately respond to a follow-up inquiry about the discrepancy between Friday’s memo and its contingency plan.

In the memo, USDA said transferring money toward SNAP from other sources “would pull away funding for school meals and infant formula.” 

The agency said it has shuffled funds to cover several nutrition programs during the shutdown, including the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, or WIC, as well as the National School Lunch Program, School Breakfast Program, and the Child and Adult Care Food Program. 

Dems call on Rollins to tap into fund

U.S. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said last week the government would run out of funds to deliver November SNAP benefits as a result of the ongoing shutdown.  

Friday morning, U.S. House Democrats, like nearly all of their Senate counterparts and the Republican chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, urged Rollins to not only use the contingency fund, but to reprogram other money to cover a $3 billion shortfall. 

“A potential lapse in benefits would be felt by Americans of all ages and affect every corner and congressional district in the country,” according to the letter from more than 200 House Democrats.

In a separate letter, 46 Senate Democrats sent to Rollins on Wednesday, voicing concerns that USDA told states to hold off on sending in SNAP benefits to be processed for November. 

“We were deeply disturbed to hear that the USDA has instructed states to stop processing SNAP benefits for November and were surprised by your recent comments that the program will ‘run out of money in two weeks,’” according to the letter. “In fact, the USDA has several tools available which would enable SNAP benefits to be paid through or close to the end of November.” 

The chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Republican Susan Collins of Maine, also urged Rollins in a Thursday letter to “consider all available options in accordance with federal law to ensure that this vital nutrition assistance continues, including the use of contingency funds and looking at the viability of partial payments or any transfer authority you may have.” 

Benefits could be slow even if a deal reached

States have been told by the agency to hold off on submitting SNAP benefit requests to processing centers. Food banks and pantries are already bracing for the increased need, including in Iowa, where more than 270,000 Iowans rely on SNAP each month.

However, even if Congress immediately reached a deal to end the shutdown, the time needed to process the payments and make them available for recipients means SNAP benefits would likely be delayed. State officials have warned SNAP recipients of the possibility of delays.

In West Virginia, officials said delays are expected and told residents to seek assistance at local food pantries. Roughly 1 in 6 West Virginia residents rely on SNAP each month. 

Legal requirement cited

Sharon Parrott, a White House Office of Management and Budget official during the Obama administration who now leads a left-leaning think tank, said in a Thursday statement that USDA is legally required to use its SNAP contingency funds.

Parrott, the president of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, said the multi-year contingency fund is “billions of dollars that Congress provided for use when SNAP funding is inadequate that remain available during the shutdown — to fund November benefits for the 1 in 8 Americans who need SNAP to afford their grocery bill.”

Parrott said the Trump administration could use its legal transfer authority, just as it did with WIC funding, to “supplement the contingency reserves, which by themselves are not enough to fund families’ full benefits.”

Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., talks to a reporter in the basement of the U.S. Capitol on Thursday, Oct. 23, 2025. (Photo by Ashley Murray/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — The Senate Thursday failed to advance a Republican measure and rejected unanimous agreements on two related bills from Democrats that would have paid federal employees and contractors who have continued to work amid the government shutdown, which entered day 23. 

The stalemate constituted the latest example of how dug in to their arguments both parties are as the shutdown that began Oct. 1 drags out, as well as the heightened political tensions in the upper chamber when it comes to striking a deal to resume government funding.  

Most federal employees will miss their first full paycheck on Friday or early next week. More than 42 million Americans, some 40% under the age of 17, are also at risk of delayed food assistance if Congress doesn’t address a funding shortfall expected by Nov. 1 in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP. 

Senate Democrats Wednesday sent a letter to U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins over concerns that the agency has warned states to hold off on processing SNAP benefits. They contended the agency has the resources to keep payments flowing.

“We were deeply disturbed to hear that the USDA has instructed states to stop processing SNAP benefits for November and were surprised by your recent comments that the program will ‘run out of money in two weeks,’” according to the letter. “In fact, the USDA has several tools available which would enable SNAP benefits to be paid through or close to the end of November.”

Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., introduced a bill Wednesday to continue SNAP funding through the shutdown. During Thursday’s briefing, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the administration would “absolutely support” the legislation.

Deadlock on federal worker pay

In the Senate, a measure from Wisconsin GOP Sen. Ron Johnson on a 54-45 vote did not reach the 60-vote threshold needed to advance in the chamber. Its failure means that federal employees who have continued to work will not be paid until the shutdown ends.

Democratic senators who agreed to the measure included Pennsylvania’s John Fetterman and Georgia’s Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock. Senate Majority Leader John Thune of South Dakota changed his vote in order to reconsider the measure. 

“I don’t think it makes sense to hold these federal workers hostage,” Warnock told States Newsroom in an interview on his vote Thursday. “If I could have a path to give some of these folks relief while fighting for health care, that’s what I decided to do.”

A separate measure from Maryland Democratic Sen. Chris Van Hollen also failed to move forward after Johnson objected. Van Hollen requested unanimous consent to approve his bill that would have also protected federal workers from mass Reductions in Force, or RIFs, that President Donald Trump has attempted during the shutdown. 

A second Democratic bill, from Sen. Gary Peters, D-Mich., was narrower, only including pay for federal workers. But when he requested unanimous approval for his measure, it was also blocked by Johnson.

Senators then left Capitol Hill for the weekend. On Wednesday, the Senate took a failed 12th vote to provide the federal government and its services with flat funding through Nov. 21.

Senate Republicans have pressed Senate Democrats to approve the GOP-written stopgap measure. But Democrats have maintained that they will not support the House measure because it does not extend tax credits that will expire at the end of the year for people who buy their health insurance through the Affordable Care Act Marketplace.

Layoffs cited by Van Hollen

Van Hollen argued his bill would protect workers from the president’s targeting of certain federal agencies and programs.

“We certainly shouldn’t set up a system where the president of the United States gets to decide what agencies to shut down, what they can open, who to pay and who not to pay, who to punish and who not to punish,” Van Hollen said on the Senate floor before asking for unanimous consent to move the bill forward.

Johnson objected to including Van Hollen’s provision to ban federal worker layoffs during a shutdown. President Donald Trump’s efforts to lay off thousands of federal workers during the shutdown have been on hold since last week, after a federal judge issued a temporary restraining order that was later expanded.  

However, Johnson said he was willing to add into his own bill the provision from Van Hollen to pay furloughed workers.

“I’m more than happy to sit down with you. Maybe we should do that later today,” Van Hollen told Johnson during their debate on the floor.

Shortly after, Peters introduced a near-mirror version of Van Hollen’s bill, except that his measure would not prohibit layoffs — essentially what Johnson told Van Hollen he would agree to.

“We all say we agree on this, so let’s just pass this bill now,” the Michigan Democrat said before asking for unanimous consent to advance the legislation.

Johnson also objected to that proposal.

“It only solves a problem temporarily. We’re going to be right back in the same position,” Johnson said in an interview with States Newsroom about why he rejected Peters’ proposal.  

Johnson said he talked with Peters and Van Hollen after the vote and “we’ll be talking beyond this.”

‘Waste of time’ for House to meet

Even if the Senate passed the bill sponsored by Johnson or Van Hollen, it’s unlikely the House, which has been in recess since last month, would return to vote on either measure.

At a Thursday morning press conference, House Speaker Mike Johnson argued that Republicans already passed a stopgap measure to pay federal workers and that Senate Democrats should support that legislation. 

Johnson said bringing back the House would be a “waste of time,” noting that Democrats would not vote on the Republican proposal. 

“If I brought everybody back right now and we voted on a measure to do this, to pay essential workers, it would be spiked in the Senate,” said the Louisiana Republican. “So it would be a waste of our time.”

Duffy warns of flight delays due to shutdown

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy joined Johnson and House Republicans during their press conference. 

He said that flight delays have increased due to staffing shortages.

More than 50,000 TSA agents and more than 13,000 air traffic controllers have continued to work without pay during the government shutdown. 

“They’re angry,” Duffy said of air traffic controllers. “I’ve gone to a number of different towers over the course of the last week to 10 days. They’re frustrated.”

Next Tuesday, air traffic controllers will not receive their full paycheck for their work in October, Duffy said.

He added that the agency is already short-staffed — by up to 3,000 air traffic controllers.

“When we have lower staffing, what happens is, you’ll see delays or cancellations,” Duffy said. 

The FlightAware tracker said there were 2,132 delays within, into or out of the United States of unspecified length reported by Thursday afternoon, compared to 4,175 on Wednesday, 3,846 on Tuesday and 6,792 on Monday.

A shortage of air traffic controllers helped play a role in ending the 2019 government shutdown, which lasted 35 days, after thousands of commercial flights were ground to a halt. 

U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., talks with reporters inside the Capitol building in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday, Oct. 21, 2025. (Photo by Jennifer Shutt/States Newsroom)

WASHINGTON — The government shutdown became the second longest in U.S. history Wednesday, though the mounting repercussions for dozens of federal programs, including food aid for some of the country’s most vulnerable residents, failed to spur any momentum in Congress. 

The Senate was unable for the 12th time to advance a stopgap spending bill that would have reopened the government and kept funding mostly on autopilot through Nov. 21. 

The 54-46 vote was nearly identical to those that have come before, a predictable outcome since neither Republicans nor Democrats are talking to each other. The legislation needed at least 60 votes to advance under the Senate’s legislative filibuster. 

Nevada Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto and Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman, both Democrats, and Maine independent Sen. Angus King voted with Republicans to advance the legislation. Kentucky GOP Sen. Rand Paul voted no.

The vote came shortly after Oregon Democratic Sen. Jeff Merkley held the floor for nearly 23 hours, speaking at length about his concerns and objections to President Donald Trump’s administration. 

The government staying shut down much longer will lead to a funding shortfall for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, which is relied on by 42 million low-income Americans, nearly 40% of them children younger than 17. 

Despite that looming deadline, congressional leaders remain in their political silos, just as they have since before the shutdown began 22 days ago. They’ve repeatedly held press conferences and meetings with their own members instead of making the types of compromises needed to keep government functioning on the most basic level. 

Republican leaders are waiting for Democrats to help advance the stopgap spending bill in the Senate and say they won’t negotiate on anything until after that happens. 

Democrats maintain they won’t support the House-passed continuing resolution until there is bipartisan agreement to extend tax credits that are set to expire at the end of the year for people who buy their health insurance through the Affordable Care Act Marketplace. 

Johnson warns funding process at risk

The stalled short-term spending bill is supposed to give lawmakers more time to work out agreement on the dozen full-year government funding bills, which Congress was supposed to pass by the Oct. 1 start of the fiscal year. 

But Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., warned during a morning press conference that lawmakers may scrap that process for a second year in a row if Democrats don’t advance the continuing resolution soon. 

“We’re getting closer to November. It is going to be more and more difficult with each passing hour to get all the appropriations done on time,” Johnson said. “We acknowledge that, but we have to do this on a day-by-day basis.”

House Democratic leadership dismissed the notion of a longer temporary spending bill or continuing resolution, possibly for a full year, during an afternoon press conference. 

Democratic Whip Katherine Clark, of Massachusetts, said her message to Republicans is, “Why are you talking about the length of the (continuing resolution)? Come to the table and negotiate with us. End this health care crisis, help the American people.”

Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries sidestepped specifics when asked about a longer stopgap funding bill.

“At this point, we need to reopen the government. We need to enact a spending bill that actually meets the needs of the American people in terms of their health, their safety and economic well-being, particularly in terms of driving down the high cost of living, while at the same time decisively addressing the Republican health care crisis that grows greatly by the day,” the New York Democrat said.

Lawmakers have been unable to approve all the annual funding bills on time since 1996 and have consistently relied on stopgap spending bills to give themselves more time to work out agreements between the House and Senate. 

The alternative to full-year government funding bills is to use a series of stopgap spending bills, or one that lasts the entire year that keeps spending mostly on autopilot. 

Either option requires bipartisanship to gain the support of at least 60 senators, since Republicans control 53 seats. That means the only solution to the shutdown is for Republican and Democratic leaders to compromise. 

But that seemed like a remote possibility Wednesday. 

Democrats criticize layoffs

House Democrats’ Steering and Policy Committee held a mock hearing where they railed against Republicans and Trump for how they’ve managed unified control of government. 

House Appropriations Committee ranking member Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., rebuked Trump administration officials for trying to lay off federal workers by the thousands and for canceling funding to projects in regions of the country that vote for Democrats. 

“It is a corrupt abuse of power that they have chosen to carry out,” DeLauro said. 

White House budget director Russ Vought and Trump, she said, “have launched a scorched earth campaign to decimate the federal government and the programs and services the American people depend on.”

Rob Shriver, managing director of the civil service strong and good government initiatives at Democracy Forward, who worked as deputy director at the Office of Personnel Management during the Biden administration, said the layoffs could negatively affect federal operations for years. 

“The government has had historic challenges in recruiting young people and recruiting tech talent, and what this administration is doing is turning it into a workforce that doesn’t try to recruit the best and the brightest, but that tries to recruit the most loyal,” Shriver said. 

Lawsuit gains more unions

The Trump administration’s efforts to lay off thousands of workers during the shutdown have been on hold since last week, when a federal judge issued a temporary restraining order that was later expanded.  

The lawsuit was originally brought by the American Federation of Government Employees and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. It expanded last week to include the National Federation of Federal Employees, the National Association of Government Employees and the Service Employees International Union.

The updated restraining order issued by U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California Judge Susan Illston applies to any federal department or agency that includes employees represented by those unions, even if the Trump administration doesn’t recognize their contracts. 

Illston on Wednesday granted a request to add the National Treasury Employees Union, International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers and American Federation of Teachers to the case. 

Illston wrote that she found “good cause exists to modify the existing TRO without a written response from defendants due to the emergency nature of this case.” 

Those three unions represent hundreds of thousands more federal workers, including those at the departments of Commerce, Defense, Energy, Health and Human Services, Interior, Justice and Veterans Affairs. 

Employees at the Environmental Protection Agency, Internal Revenue Service, National Aeronautics and Space Administration and Social Security Administration are also represented by the three new unions seeking to join the case. 

The next stage in the lawsuit comes on Oct. 28, when the judge has set a hearing to determine whether to issue a preliminary injunction in the case. 

‘Patently illegal’

AFGE National President Everett Kelley wrote in a statement released Wednesday that the “administration’s move to fire thousands of patriotic civil servants while the government is shut down is patently illegal, and I’m glad we are able to expand our lawsuit to protect even more federal workers from facing termination.”

“President Trump has made no secret that this is about punishing his political enemies and has nothing to do with the actual work that these employees perform,” Kelley added. “Data provided by the administration under court order illustrates how vast and unlawful these intended firings are and validates our union’s determination to challenge this illegal action.”

Ashley Murray contributed to this report. 

A “SNAP welcomed here” sign is seen at the entrance to a Big Lots store in Portland, Oregon. (Getty Images)

WASHINGTON — More than 42 million low-income Americans are at risk of losing food assistance Nov. 1 if the government shutdown continues.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture, which operates the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, has about $6 billion in a multi-year contingency fund. That’s short of the roughly $9 billion needed to cover a full month of the program.

Even if a shutdown deal were reached immediately, the time needed to process the payments and make them available for recipients means benefits would likely be delayed.

The shortfall is caused by the shutdown, which hit its 22nd day Wednesday. The fund is supposed to maintain a balance of about $9 billion, but $3 billion of the funds expired at the end of the fiscal year Sept. 30. Because Congress has not approved the next year’s funding, the fund only has $6 billion.

USDA would have to come up with the remaining $3 billion. The department could try something similar to its shuffle of more than $300 million in tariff revenue into its Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, or WIC, through the rest of the month. 

It’s unclear if USDA plans to use the SNAP contingency fund or any other maneuvers to extend benefits.

Nearly 40% of the 42 million SNAP recipients nationwide are children 17 and younger, according to the USDA. About 20% are seniors aged 60 and older and the remaining 40% are adults aged 18 to 59.

USDA did not respond to multiple requests for comment from States Newsroom.

Parties in Congress remained nowhere near a deal to end the shutdown as of Wednesday.

States scrambling

A Democratic congressional staffer familiar with the SNAP program said that even if Congress passes a stopgap before Nov. 1, the month’s benefits will still be delayed because it takes time to process the benefits and there are limited vendor processors.

The program issues electronic benefits on a card that can be used like cash to purchase food. States will upload either all or part of a month’s benefits on the first day of the month.

Even in states that say they have enough funds to extend SNAP through November, such as North Dakota, state officials have said they are unable to load the funds on the cards. 

Kansas officials said once Congress passes a stopgap, the state can distribute benefits to the state’s 188,000 SNAP recipients within 72 hours, meaning any deal would have to be completed by next week to avoid an interruption of services. 

Other states, including Minnesota, have halted new enrollments in SNAP. 

Wisconsin’s Gov. Tony Evers warned that 700,000 residents are at risk of losing their SNAP benefits. 

Tennessee officials have informed SNAP recipients — nearly 700,000 people — that it received notice from USDA that SNAP funding will cease entirely on Nov. 1 if the government shutdown doesn’t end.

Unheeded warnings

USDA on Oct. 10  warned states to hold off on sending SNAP files to electronic benefit transfer vendors due to the government shutdown

“Considering the operational issues and constraints that exist in automated systems, and in the interest of preserving maximum flexibility, we are forced to direct States to hold their November issuance files and delay transmission to State EBT vendors until further notice,” SNAP acting Associate Administrator Ronald Ward wrote. 

“This includes on-going SNAP benefits and daily files,” Ward continued. 

Last week, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said that SNAP will run out of funds by the end of the month if Congress fails to strike a deal and end the government shutdown.

An Oakland, Calif., grocery store displays a sign notifying shoppers that it accepts electronic benefit transfer cards used by state welfare departments to issue food assistance benefits. States are just beginning to implement changes to work requirements for the national food stamp program approved by Congress and President Donald Trump this summer. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

States are rushing to inform some residents who rely on food stamps that they will soon be forced to meet work requirements or lose their food assistance.

Recent federal legislation ended exemptions to work requirements for older adults, homeless people, veterans and some rural residents, among others. A rapid timeline to put the changes into effect has sparked chaos in state agencies that must cut off access if residents don’t meet certain work, education or volunteer reporting requirements.

States are implementing these permanent changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program — commonly called food stamps — amid the uncertainty of the federal government shutdown. The budget impasse could result in millions of Americans not getting their SNAP benefits next month if money runs out. But even before the shutdown, states were assessing the new work rules for food stamps — the first in a wave of cutbacks to the nation’s largest food assistance program required under President Donald Trump’s major tax and spending law enacted in July.

Known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, the law mandates cuts to social service programs, including Medicaid and food stamps. In the coming years, the law will require states to pay a greater share of administering SNAP and could cause millions of Americans to lose benefits.

But states are currently confronting the end of exceptions to work requirements for older adults, homeless people, veterans and those recently living in foster care. Those could threaten benefits even for people who are working but who may struggle with the paperwork to prove they’re meeting the requirements, advocates say.

Under the new law, states have also lost funding for nutrition education programs, must end eligibility for noncitizens such as refugees and asylees, and will lose work requirement waivers for those living in areas with limited employment opportunities.

And the federal government wants those changes made quickly.

“They’ve given us a virtually nonexistent window — I’ll just describe it that way — in which to implement the changes, so we are working on them very quickly,” Andrea Barton Reeves, commissioner of the Connecticut Department of Social Services, told lawmakers last week.

She said changing work requirements could threaten the benefits of tens of thousands of people in Connecticut.

“We do believe that if we cannot in some way either move them into another exemption category or they don’t meet the requirements, we have about 36,000 people in these new categories that are at risk of losing their SNAP benefit,” Barton Reeves told lawmakers.

The federal government issued guidance to states earlier this month saying several key changes to food stamps would need to be implemented by early November.

The Food Research & Action Center, a nonprofit working to address poverty-related hunger, characterized that deadline as an “unreasonable” timeline for states.

In California, for example, the state previously had been approved for a waiver to work requirements through January 2026. But this month, USDA told states they had 30 days to terminate waivers issued under the previous guidelines. In California, the end of that waiver could affect benefits for an estimated 359,000 people.

Gina Plata-Nino, interim SNAP director at the Food Research & Action Center, said states must quickly train their social services workers on eligibility changes, communicate those changes to the public and deal with an onslaught of calls from people relying on the program.

“It’s incredibly complex,” she said.

Plata-Nino said implementation will be uneven: Some states are already in compliance with the changes, while others will phase them in as households go through regular eligibility reviews.

USDA and the White House did not respond to Stateline’s questions about the changes.

Republicans, including House Speaker Mike Johnson of Louisiana, have said the cuts would eliminate waste in the food assistance program. In a June news release, he characterized SNAP as a “bloated, inefficient program,” but said Americans who needed food assistance would still receive it.

“Democrats will scream ‘cuts,’ but what they’re really defending is a wasteful program that discourages work, mismanages billions, and traps people in dependency. Republicans are proud to defend commonsense welfare reform, fiscal sanity, and the dignity of work,” Johnson said in the release.

Rural residents

Changes to work requirements will prove especially burdensome for rural residents, who already disproportionately rely on SNAP. Job opportunities and transportation are often limited in rural areas, making work requirements especially difficult, according to Plata-Nino.

“None of these bills came with a job offer,” Plata-Nino said. “None of them came with additional funding to address the lack of transportation. Remote and rural areas don’t have public transportation — they don’t even have taxis or Ubers.”

With waivers, states previously could show USDA evidence that certain areas had limited job opportunities, thus exempting people from work requirements.

“Because it doesn’t make sense to punish SNAP participants for not being able to find a job when there are no jobs available, right?” said Lauren Bauer, a fellow in economic studies at the left-leaning Brookings Institution and the associate director of The Hamilton Project, an economic policy initiative.

The legislation changed the criteria for proving weak labor markets to what Bauer characterized as an “utterly insane standard,” of showing unemployment rates above 10%. (The national unemployment rate was 4.3% in August, according to the most recently released figures by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.)

“The national economy during the Great Recession hit 10% in one month,” Bauer said. “Ten percent unemployment is a very, very high level. So they set this standard basically to end the waiver process.”

That change will not only affect recipients now but also will drastically impair the program’s ability to respond to recessions: Traditionally, SNAP has quickly helped people who lose their jobs. But the new law requires states to cover more costs, meaning they will be stretched even thinner during economic downturns when demand increases.

“Not only are these changes difficult to implement — and certainly at the speed that the administration is asking for — they could be devastating to the program, to residents who are in need in their states, and eventually SNAP may no longer be a national program because states will not be able to afford to participate,” Bauer said.

‘Widespread confusion’

Since July, Pennsylvania officials have been working to not only inform the public about the federal changes, but also to update information technology systems — a process that generally takes a minimum of 12 months.

“Strictly speaking from an IT perspective, we’re talking about massive systems that generate terabytes of data and are working with records for hundreds of thousands — and in the case of Pennsylvania, 2 million people,” said Hoa Pham, deputy secretary of the Office of Income Maintenance for the Pennsylvania Department of Human Services.

Pham said the timing of the federal legislation and lagging guidance from USDA was “simply not ideal.” But the state is doing its best to train thousands of employees on the changes and help affected recipients get into compliance by finding work, education or volunteer opportunities that meet federal guidelines.

The end of geographic waivers put the benefits of about 132,000 SNAP recipients at risk in Pennsylvania.

“It is difficult, it requires time, it requires planning, it requires money,” she told Stateline. “And I want to be super clear that H.R. 1 [the new law] delivered a ton of unfunded mandates to state agencies.”

Pennsylvania created a detailed webpage outlining the changes and will notify individuals if their eligibility is jeopardized in the coming months. Pham said those who depend on SNAP should make sure their contact information is up to date with both the department and the post office.

“As a state agency, we’re working very hard to make sure that people have accurate, factual information when it is most immediately necessary for them to know it,” she said.

States are implementing the SNAP changes even as the ongoing federal government shutdown might temporarily cost recipients their benefits.

New Hampshire leaders say they are days away from running out of food stamp funds. No new applications will be approved in Minnesota until the government is reopened, officials announced last week.

And the changes hit agencies already strained from staffing shortages and outdated software, said Brittany Christenson, the CEO of AidKit, a vendor that helps states administer SNAP and other public benefits.

“The result is widespread confusion among both administrators and beneficiaries, as states are tasked with integrating new compliance requirements while maintaining service continuity.

“The changes not only increase workloads for states, but they can lead to more errors and longer wait time or applicants,” Christenson said.

“Beneficiaries face a heightened risk of losing aid not because they are unwilling to work, but because they cannot meet new documentation or compliance requirements on time,” she said.

Slow trickle of changes

In Maine, the new work requirement rules are in place, but recipients have some time to meet the altered guidelines, the Portland Press Herald reported. The state estimates changes to work requirements could affect more than 40,000 recipients as soon as this fall.

The state’s Department of Health and Human Services did not respond to Stateline requests for comment. But advocates said food banks are already struggling to keep up with increased demand and decreased supply because of the high cost of food.

“They’re seeing huge increases in families and individuals showing up, needing groceries, needing food every month, some every week, and that’s before any of these cuts to SNAP have happened. So we’re really, we’re very worried,” said Anna Korsen, deputy director of Full Plates Full Potential, a nonprofit focused on ending childhood hunger in Maine.

More than 70% of Maine households receiving SNAP have at least one person working, Korsen said. While some recipients — including those who are caretakers for relatives — cannot work, many more who are employed will struggle to meet documentation requirements.

“They call them work requirements, but we’ve started calling them work reporting requirements, because we think that’s a more accurate way to portray what they are,” she said.

Alex Carter, policy advocate at the nonprofit legal aid organization Maine Equal Justice, said SNAP recipients will be affected on a rolling basis because of regular six-month eligibility reviews. For example, a 59-year-old who previously would have been exempt from the work requirement may not be notified until next month that their eligibility status is in jeopardy.

“So people are not going to be losing their benefits this month because of those changes, which I think is the thing that is hard to explain to people,” she said. “These things are happening, but we can’t tell people this will happen to you in October or this will happen to you in January. It’s different on a case-by-case basis.”

Carter said her organization is urging Mainers to ensure their contact information is correct with the state and to remain vigilant for official communications on SNAP.

While states are forced to implement the federal changes, Carter said they should emphasize they’re only the messengers. She said Congress and the president should be held responsible for the fallout when people begin losing benefits.

‘It’s very natural to think this is a state decision, or this is a departmental decision, and to direct your anger and your frustration there,” she said. “ … In this case, this is not a state decision. They are required by federal law to implement these work reporting changes.”

Stateline reporter Kevin Hardy can be reached at khardy@stateline.org. 

A shopper who receives SNAP benefits slides an EBT card at a checkout counter in a Washington, D.C., grocery store in December 2024. (Photo by U.S. Department of Agriculture)

WASHINGTON — As the federal government shutdown extends to day 17, and with congressional leaders nowhere near negotiating, state officials are beginning to raise concerns of potential cuts to nutrition assistance benefits that feed millions if the government isn’t reopened. 

Minnesota has already halted new enrollments in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP. And officials in Kansas, New Hampshire and New Mexico have warned their residents could miss their food assistance payments for November. 

More than 42 million Americans rely on the program, which the U.S. Department of Agriculture administers. The federal government funds nearly all the program benefits, with states administering the program.

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins warned Thursday that SNAP will run out of funds in two weeks if Congress fails to strike a deal and end the government shutdown.

“You’re talking about millions and millions of vulnerable families of hungry families that are not going to have access to these programs because of this shutdown,” she said outside the White House Thursday. 

USDA could not be reached for comment Friday. 

USDA has directed regional SNAP directors to stop working on benefits for November, according to an Oct. 10 letter obtained by Politico, written by the program’s acting associate administrator, Ronald Ward. 

“Considering the operational issues and constraints that exist in automated systems, and in the interest of preserving maximum flexibility, we are forced to direct States to hold their November issuance files and delay transmission to State EBT vendors until further notice,” Ward wrote. “This includes on-going SNAP benefits and daily files.” 

USDA has already shuffled more than $300 million in tariff revenue into the agency’s Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, or WIC, through the rest of the month. 

The shutdown started Oct. 1 after Congress failed to find a bipartisan path forward on a stopgap spending bill. 

Senate Democrats have pushed for negotiations to extend the enhanced tax credits that are set to expire at the end of the year for people who buy their health insurance from the Affordable Care Act marketplace. 

Republicans have insisted on passing the House’s version of the stopgap funding bill that does not address insurance premiums.