Jennifer Ludden
👤 SpeakerAppearances Over Time
Podcast Appearances
The Agriculture Department argues that tapping a larger pot of money to make full payments would hurt other nutrition programs.
The government's latest appeal to the Supreme Court comes despite moves to end the federal shutdown, which would render the SNAP standoff moot.
Jennifer Ludden, NPR News, Washington.
Shortly after the ruling Thursday, a growing number of states started to announce they'd send out November's SNAP payments.
Some people even woke up to the money on the cards they used to buy groceries.
Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro said benefits would keep going out all night.
The Trump administration earlier said it only had money for partial payments and those could take weeks.
A federal judge said officials had moved too slowly and failed to consider the risk of people going hungry.
Jennifer Ludden, NPR News, Washington.
Just last week, the same judge, John McConnell Jr., ordered the release of at least partial SNAP payments.
A group of cities and nonprofits argued that was not enough and could take weeks for some states to administer.
He said the administration had ignored the harmful consequences of slashing the nation's biggest anti-hunger program.
He also said President Trump showed intent to defy a court order when he posted on Truth Social this week that SNAP benefits would not restart until after the federal shutdown was over.
The administration's appeal once again puts food aid on hold for millions of people as food banks around the country scramble to help fill the gap.
Jennifer Ludden, NPR News, Washington.
The judge in this case ordered the Trump administration to use a $4 or $5 billion contingency fund to at least pay partial benefits.
But he and another judge in Boston in a separate lawsuit both said there is a bigger pot of money from customs revenues that the Trump administration could use to make full SNAP payments.
Now, the government had declined to do that.
It said it wants to keep that money for other uses like child nutrition programs.