The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) provides monthly food assistance—commonly referred to as food stamps—to low-income households, helping one in eight Americans buy groceries.[1] The program serves about 42 million Americans, with average monthly payments of $187.[2] According to one professor at Johns Hopkins University, without these essential benefits, the country would face “a potential public health crisis of food insecurity and hunger.”[3] Thus, prior to the government shutdown that began on October 1, 2025, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) indicated that contingency reserves would be available to continue paying benefits during the shutdown.[4] Yet later that month, the Trump Administration reversed course and announced that it would not tap into reserves to continue funding SNAP, claiming that the funds were meant for disasters and emergencies like “hurricanes, tornados, and floods,” despite legal experts claiming otherwise.[5] According to the announcement, recipients would not receive their regular payments on November 1, 2025, marking the first time in the program’s history that benefits were suspended.[6] Many described this reversal as a political tactic and weaponization of hunger, rather than a legal or fiscal requirement.[7]

As millions of Americans faced growing food insecurity, roughly two dozen states sued the Trump Administration, claiming that the refusal to fund SNAP was illegal and asking the judge to order the USDA to resume payments.[8] Days later, a coalition of cities, religious groups, and nonprofits filed a separate lawsuit.[9] A federal judge ordered the Administration to make SNAP payments in full by November 7, 2025, triggering appeals to the First Circuit and then the Supreme Court.[10] The Supreme Court temporarily halted the order to make payments in full while the First Circuit considered the case on appeal.[11] Yet, by that point, many states had already begun releasing benefits to their residents in accordance with the district court’s ruling.[12] Other states delayed their distributions, leaving families without the vital food aid they depended on.[13] Some recipients reported that their Electronic Benefits Transfer (EBT) cards were declined, even after the funds had been transferred into their accounts.[14]

As low-income families across the country remained in limbo, the Trump Administration directed states to claw back any SNAP benefits that had already been released and threatened to impose financial penalties on states that did not comply.[15] The next day, the First Circuit ruled against the Trump Administration, leaving the lower court’s order to make full payments in place.[16] One day later, a federal judge temporarily blocked the Administration’s order to “undo” the benefits already paid.[17] The legal saga finally concluded on November 12, 2025 with the end of the shutdown.

Yet even as payments resumed, many SNAP recipients were left shaken.[18] Some went days to weeks without receiving their full monthly payments, and many reported declining trust in the system.[19] Jeanne Nihart, a 44-year-old mother in Anoka, Minnesota, received her full benefits but explained to the New York Times that the uncertainty was not over: “If I use those benefits, what happens if they need to be reversed or taken back? Does that mean I won’t get benefits in December?”[20] Others worry that the funding could be stopped again.[21] Fears may intensify as policymakers move to narrow the program further: the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, passed in July 2025, cuts roughly $187 billion from SNAP’s total budget through 2034, reducing coverage and imposing new requirements that could make it harder for families to access the assistance they need.[22] The food crisis posed by the 2025 shutdown was averted, but millions of Americans have now experienced the fragility of the system they rely on to put food on the table.

[1] Linda Qui & Tony Romm, Trump Administration Won’t Use Emergency Funds for Food Stamps During Shutdown, N.Y. Times (Oct. 24, 2025), https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/24/us/politics/trump-food-stamps-shutdown.html [https://perma.cc/GW2C-Z2UB].

[2] Id.

[3] Morgan Coulson, What Is SNAP? And Why Does It Matter?, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg Sch. Pub. Health (Oct. 29, 2025), https://publichealth.jhu.edu/2025/what-is-snap-and-why-does-it-matter [https://perma.cc/K52P-4336].

[4] U.S. Dep’t Agric., Lapse of Funding Plan (Sep. 30, 2025).

[5] Qui & Romm, supra note 1.

[6] Michael Sainato, Snap workers say Trump administration is ‘using country’s poorest as pawns’, Guardian (Nov. 10, 2025), https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/nov/10/snap-workers-trump-administration-funding [https://perma.cc/HHY8-LJBU].

[7] See, e.g., Jacob Rosen & Melissa Quinn, Judge orders Trump administration to fully fund SNAP benefits for November by Friday, C.B.S. News (Nov. 7, 2025), https://www.cbsnews.com/news/judge-orders-trump-fully-fund-snap-benefits-november/ [https://perma.cc/MX6A-776K]; Zeeshan Aleem, Trump is blatantly using hunger as a political weapon, M.S.N.B.C. (Nov. 5, 2025), https://www.ms.now/opinion/msnbc-opinion/trump-snap-benefits-right-wing-populism-rcna242151 [https://perma.cc/K2LH-J2F9]; Sainato, supra note 6; Press Release, Senator Chris Coons, Remarks: Senator Coons Condemns President Trump’s Weaponization of SNAP as a Betrayal of Faith in Senate Floor Speech (Nov. 5, 2025), https://www.coons.senate.gov/news/press-releases/remarks-senator-coons-condemns-president-trumps-weaponization-of-snap-as-a-betrayal-of-faith-in-senate-floor-speech [https://perma.cc/QD76-53LX].

[8] Isabela Espadas Barros Leal & Tony Romm, A Timeline of the Legal Saga Surrounding SNAP Payments, N.Y. Times (Nov. 8, 2025), https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/08/us/politics/snap-payments-timeline.html [https://perma.cc/W8WG-322W].

[9]  Id.

[10] Jennifer Ludden, Trump administration ordered to restore full SNAP benefits by Friday, N.P.R. (Nov. 7, 2025), https://www.npr.org/2025/11/06/nx-s1-5600097/snap-partial-payments-trump-administration [https://perma.cc/2X34-Y9EC]; Tony Romm et al., Families in Limbo After Supreme Court Order Interrupts Food Stamp Payments, N.Y. Times (Nov. 8, 2025), https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/08/us/politics/families-food-stamps-supreme-court-order.html [https://perma.cc/4MSF-H6U9].

[11] Romm et al., supra note 10; Dan Mangan, Supreme Court pauses order that Trump administration must pay full SNAP benefits, C.N.B.C. (Nov. 7, 2025), https://www.cnbc.com/2025/11/07/snap-trump-appeals-food-stamps.html [https://perma.cc/ELB2-M5ZA].

[12] Romm et al., supra note 10.

[13] Id.

[14] Id.

[15] Tony Romm, Trump Administration Demands States ‘Undo’ Work to Send Full Food Stamps, N.Y. Times (Nov. 9, 2025), https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/09/us/politics/trump-administration-states-undo-full-snap-food-stamps.html [https://perma.cc/W8GC-TZ2Q].

[16] Leal & Romm, supra note 8.

[17] Id.

[18] Jacey Fortin et al., ‘A Traumatic Experience’: SNAP Interruption Leaves Recipients Shaken, N.Y. Times (Nov. 14, 2025), https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/14/us/shutdown-snap-food-stamps.html [https://perma.cc/YG6N-Y7CV].

[19] Id.; Geoff Mulvihill & David A. Lieb, As shutdown ends, states scramble to send SNAP benefits to millions, P.B.S. News (Nov. 13, 2025), https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/as-shutdown-ends-states-scramble-to-send-snap-benefits-to-millions [https://perma.cc/M8EQ-6DMG].

[20] Fortin et al., supra note 18.

[21] Id.

[22] Nancy Stedman, Even When SNAP Payments Resume, More Food Cuts Will Affect Millions of Americans, Leonard Davis Inst. Health Econ. (Nov. 3, 2025), https://ldi.upenn.edu/our-work/research-updates/even-when-snap-payments-resume-more-food-cuts-will-affect-millions-of-americans/ [https://perma.cc/K3DY-UAWX]; Lauren Kallins, 5 Changes the ‘Beautiful’ Bill Is Bringing to SNAP, N.C.S.L. (Oct. 22, 2025), https://www.ncsl.org/state-legislatures-news/details/5-changes-the-beautiful-bill-is-bringing-to-snap [https://perma.cc/DJP7-3TFP].