November 6, 2025
Full SNAP benefits must go out tomorrow. Not half. Not next week. Full snap benefits for 42 million Americans by tomorrow Friday November 7th. That’s what a federal judge in Rhode Island just told the Trump administration during a fiery hearing.
But just minutes ago – instead of complying with this judge’s order to fully fund SNAP– the Trump administration filed an appeal. Because they don’t want to comply with this judge’s order. They believe giving partial payments to SNAP beneficiaries in the month of November should be enough. And because of this government shutdown – there is no more money.
So let me just back up and explain what happened during that hearing today because – this judge is pissed. He believes the Trump administration is playing politics with this critical food assistance program and he’s not having it. Last Friday — the judge ordered the Trump administration to distribute those funds asap. But as of today almost a week later – SNAP recipients haven’t gotten anything. During the hearing today the judge cited this social media post from Tuesday from President Trump where Trump said he would not release SNAP benefits until Democrats voted to reopen the government. Of course the White House press secretary immediately walked that comment back because Trump was openly defying the judge’s order. Even though the white house backpedaled — the judge noticed.
As I told you in this video on Monday – the Trump administration told that very same judge that they would release the contingency — or emergency – SNAP fund while the government was shutdown to pay out the SNAP benefits. But they said that fund only had $4.65 billion in it and since it costs the US government about $8 billion a month to fully fund SNAP, that meant that they would only be able to pay out about 50% of SNAP benefits to each recipient. …and that could take weeks or months to do depending on how modern the SNAP systems were in each state.
Well – just yesterday – the Trump administration amended that plan. They filed this document with the Rhode Island federal court saying — well – now –treasury secretary Scott Bessent and USDA “performed further analysis” and they found more money for SNAP benefits. They said instead of a 50% benefit reduction, the US government will only reduce SNAP benefits by 35% for each recipient. But today – the judge said no. He wants the administration to fund 100% of SNAP benefits right now.
Read the the court order here.
