The Trump administration told states Friday that it would be releasing funds to support federal food assistance during the government shutdown — just hours before winning a Supreme Court stay of lower court orders, apparently putting the payments on hold again.
It is just the latest example of the on-again, off-again policy changes that have left benefit recipients guessing on their status, and states, counties and local food aid organizations riding the policy “roller coaster” that has federal support for food assistance here one moment, gone the next.
It has also made it “difficult to know what to communicate” to recipients of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, for the state and county officials who administer the program.
“I think the roller coaster is really with the federal government,” said Heather Bois Bruskin, director of the Office of Food Systems Resilience in Montgomery County. “First it was that the November benefits won’t be coming. Then with the court action, they were directed to release the funds that are set aside for SNAP benefits in situations just like this.
“At this moment, it is very uncertain when and how and in what amount the federal government will be contributing to SNAP benefits for November.”
Meanwhile, state and some county officials are moving funds around in an effort to mitigate the damage, regardless of how things shake out at the federal level.
Anne Arundel, Montgomery, Baltimore counties and the city of Baltimore have allocated additional dollars to support local meal assistance networks and help provide meals for families who may be struggling to put food on the table.
For example, Bruskin said that Montgomery County plans to move an additional $3.5 million next week for the local food network, adding on to county dollars already earmarked to help food banks and pantries.
Gov. Wes Moore (D) last week declared a state of emergency that allowed him to allocate $10 million for food pantries around the state. He followed that on Tuesday with the announcement that the state would budget $62 million under the same emergency order directly to SNAP recipients in the state for their November benefits.
Maryland officials said Friday that the $62 million earmarked in that executive order will still go out, paying for about half of the monthly SNAP benefits for the more than 680,000 Marylanders in the program. Those funds will be loaded into electronic benefit transfer accounts on Monday night and will be available Tuesday for those whose benefits have already lapsed.
“Maryland families shouldn’t have to suffer because the federal government chose to pause vital benefits,” Maryland Human Services Secretary Rafael López in a written statement. “We will move urgently to get Marylanders the SNAP benefits their families depend on to put food on the table.”
Since Nov. 4, an average of 30,000 Marylanders a day have seen benefits lapse as funds that would have refreshed their accounts were tied up in court and in policy fights. That means that approximately 120,000 Marylanders this week have been waiting for their electronic benefit cards to be refilled.
“It’s tragic for those families,” Del. Emily Shetty (D-Montgomery) said. “We’ve heard anecdotally of families who have gone to the grocery store and found out subsequently that they didn’t have money on their cards.”
Shetty, who chairs the House Appropriations subcommittee that oversees social services, said she grew up in poverty. She said that the days of uncertainty about the availability of federal SNAP funds is “problematic” for families that need the extra help.
“This is a life I am very familiar with,” she said. “Poverty is something that is often forced upon families, and this is why I feel so passionate that poor people cannot be pawns in these broader political games.”
SNAP mishaps
On Friday, the U.S. Department of Agriculture told states that it was working toward releasing total funding for SNAP benefits in November. That was a reversal from the outlook from just days before, when it was uncertain if funds would come down at all following recent court challenges and social media statements from President Donald Trump (R) threatening to withhold payments to punish Democrats.
Even the Friday USDA letter that told states the agency was working to fill November SNAP benefits coincided with the Trump Administration’s effort to challenge its court-ordered requirement to fund SNAP.
The last twist in the saga came late Friday, when Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson granted the government’s request to temporarily block lower courts that had ordered the USDA to immediately fund 100% of SNAP benefits for the month. It was unclear what effect that would have on the government’s promise earlier in the day to start delivering the funds to states.
“It’s not something that is helpful to the communities that we serve to continue this back and forth, and to continue panicking the entire community that relies on hunger relief and hunger benefits,” Shetty said. “We were receiving an increase in constituent calls, not just from individuals who benefit from those programs. But also from our retailers and local food banks and shelters that were really concerned about the impact on the folks they were serving.
“This continued back and forth is par for the course for the administration, but it actually has a real effect on the people who are living in poverty,” Shetty said. “And we cannot continue using poor people as pawns in this political game at the national level. It’s just immoral.”
By Danielle J. Brown
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