Washington — President Trump said Tuesday that federal food benefits provided through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program will go out only when Democrats vote to end the ongoing government shutdown.
In a post on Truth Social, the president wrote that SNAP benefits “will be given only when the Radical Left Democrats open up government, which they can easily do, and not before!”
Mr. Trump’s comment comes a day after administration lawyers told a federal court in Rhode Island that it would tap into a contingency fund to issue partial food stamp payments for November. The Justice Department said in a filing that the Department of Agriculture would provide states with information necessary for calculating the benefits due to each eligible household, which would allow states to then begin disbursements.
Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said on X that her agency sent that guidance to states Tuesday morning, but warned it would be a “cumbersome process” that could result in a weeks-long delay in food stamp payments going out recipients.
“If the government opens, families get their FULL benefit much more quickly,” she wrote.
CBS News has asked the White House for clarification about what the president’s post means for the contingency funds.
The government shutdown entered its 35th day Tuesday and is on track to become the longest in U.S. history later in the day, surpassing the lapse in federal funding that occurred during Mr. Trump’s first term.
More than 42 million Americans rely on SNAP to purchase food each month. The program is funded by the federal government and administered by states, which distribute the nutrition assistance to eligible participants. But the Department of Agriculture said late last month that the food aid would not go out to recipients on Nov. 1 because “the well has run dry” amid the government shutdown.
The notice followed the Trump administration’s decision not to use roughly $5 billion in contingency funds to keep the benefits flowing to Americans who rely on SNAP for November. The Department of Agriculture told states in a memo last month that the reserve funds were “not legally available to cover regular benefits.”
Ahead of the cutoff of food benefits at the start of the month, a group of 25 states and the District of Columbia, and a coalition of municipalities and nonprofit organizations, filed two different lawsuits claiming the administration’s decision to halt food stamp payments was illegal. They sought court orders requiring the Department of Agriculture to use the contingency fund for this month’s benefits.
In one of the cases, U.S. District Judge John McConnell on Friday ordered the Trump administration to dip into the fund to cover the lapse in SNAP payments caused by the shutdown. The judge, who sits in Rhode Island, gave the government until Monday to file a status update about the distribution of the money.
In its filing with McConnell submitted Monday, the Justice Department said the Agriculture Department would comply with his order and “fulfill its obligation to expend the full amount of SNAP contingency funds today” by providing state agencies with information about reduced SNAP payments.
Patrick Penn, a Department of Agriculture official who oversees SNAP, said in a declaration that the administration “intends to deplete SNAP contingency funds completely and provide reduced SNAP benefits for November 2025.” He told the court there is roughly $4.6 billion in the reserve for the November payments, which would be used to cover half of eligible households’ allotments.
But he warned the aid would likely not go out immediately because of possible “payment errors and significant delays” due to variations among state eligibility systems, which have to be adjusted for the reduced payments.
Lawyers for the nonprofits and municipalities have asked McConnell to issue a new order compelling the Trump administration to provide the full SNAP benefits.
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