October 20, 2025
Remember I told you the longer this government shutdown lasts – the worse it’s going to get…well…20 days in – “worse” is almost here more than 4o million men, women and children who get food assistance from the US government and their states through SNAP.
That was the Secretary of Agriculture who said last week that by November 1st… an estimated 42 million Americans could be shut out of the snap program. Recipients just won’t get their benefits. Just to be clear – SNAP — the supplemental nutrition assistance program used to be called food stamps and it’s the government program that provides food benefits to low-income families in order to supplement their grocery budgets. According to the Agriculture department about 12% of US residents receive SNAP benefits and as of 2024 their benefits averaged about $190 per month.
According to this letter sent to all SNAP administrators in all states nationwide 10 days ago – if the government doesn’t reopen, “there will be insufficient funds to pay full November SNAP benefits.” The acting administrator of snap – goes on to say – “in the interest of preserving maximum flexibility” state SNAP offices should not be sending out monthly issuance files to vendors. Without those issuance files vendors cannot load SNAP benefits onto EBT cards. And if the benefits aren’t loaded onto the cards – then SNAP beneficiaries don’t get the money to buy the groceries they need. It’s a ripple effect.
So, if you do receive SNAP benefits — what is this going to mean for you? Well – the fact is the government is shutdown because – as I’ve been reporting – congress cannot agree on how to allocate money to each department. The Department of Agriculture is one of those government departments and it oversees snap benefits. So until this shutdown is ended, legally, they can’t spend any money – including on your snap benefits.
Each state is handling this differently. Some are doing exactly what the letter says and cutting off all November payments. Some are reportedly considering sending out partial payments in November and it’s also possible that your state may pay for the benefits themselves and then get some kind of reimbursement from the federal government. But that’s all in limbo right now. If you are in this program –and concerned about November’s benefits, I highly suggest you check your state’s snap program website to figure out what you should be doing.
It’s also possible – because of this shutdown — the Trump administration could do for SNAP what they say they’re going to do for the WIC program and the 7 million low income women and children who rely on it. The white house has said that it will temporarily use tariff revenue to pay for WIC. We will have to wait and see if they choose to do the same for SNAP.
