It's been a tumultuous week for the estimated 42 million people across the country who rely on federal food assistance.
Some breathed a sigh of relief Friday afternoon after the Rhode Island game. judge ordered Trump administration Continue funding for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) across the country.
The Ministry of Agriculture has warned that this will no more paying for benefitscommonly known as food stamps, effective Nov. 1 because Congress failed pass government funding legislation. The judge, however, told the administration that it must distribute the reserve funding for the program as quickly as possible.
But much remains unknown: President Donald Trump said Friday night on Truth Social that he “has directed our lawyers to quickly ask the Court to clarify how we can legally fund SNAP.” Even if the federal government does provide funding, many states are already behind schedule, and it's unlikely that anyone expecting their SNAP benefits to be extended this weekend will receive them on time.
After a busy week spent rationing food, soliciting donations from food banks and preparing their families to survive on less money, several SNAP recipients said they are not changing course just yet.
“People are still going to have to find ways to do things until this all blows over,” said Danielle Sulton, a single mother of five in Mississippi who faces an $833 shortfall without SNAP. This weekend, she's working shifts delivering Amazon packages to make sure her family doesn't go without.
“We talked about Trump all the time,” Sulton said.
In interviews last week, 18 SNAP recipients in 11 states, including a preschool teacher, a disabled father, a pregnant mother and a Navy veteran, told NBC News about the painful choices they would have to make if they lost food assistance. Never before have so many households faced the sudden threat of benefits being cut off; SNAP did not end during previous government shutdowns.
In Wisconsin, Carmen Hernandez told her four children they might have to make do with just beans and tortillas. In Mississippi, Valerie Buck collected donations from a food pantry to feed her family of 10. In Indiana, Matthew Corbett, with $1.04 left in his SNAP account, was willing to sell his television for money to buy food.
“Why do I have to choose between paying for daycare or paying for food for my daughter?” said Lucia Graves, a single mother from Lebanon, New Hampshire.
Shrinking food portions and growing lines at food pantries
threat of termination of the SNAP program has brought renewed attention to the desperate, everyday struggle to make ends meet for America's most vulnerable. To qualify, recipients' incomes generally must be at or below 130% of the federal poverty line—less than $35,000 a year for a family of three. At least 12% of the population relies on this food assistance, including many older adults and people with disabilities, as well as low-income parents who work full-time or part-time.
The federal budget at the heart of the standoff between Republicans and Democrats in Congress includes $186 billion in cuts to SNAP programs over the next decade, the largest funding cuts in the program's history. Nonprofits are already scrambling to fill gaps amid rising food prices and recent cuts to federal funding by the Trump administration.
Many of the SNAP recipients surveyed said that without benefits, they would only have enough food to last two or three days before having to turn to charitable organizations or put off paying bills.
