Judge Skeptical Over Trump Administration Move to Suspend SNAP
“The Trump administration on Thursday staunchly defended its decision to stop paying food stamps during the government shutdown, telling a federal court that it could not tap a tranche of available funds to provide aid to millions of poor Americans in November.
The arguments at times appeared to frustrate and confound a federal judge, who promised to rule soon on a lawsuit filed by roughly two dozen states that seek to ensure people do not go hungry as a result of a budgetary dispute.
The legal wrangling concerned the imminent fate of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, which provides monthly benefits to roughly 42 million people nationally. By Nov. 1, the program is set to exhaust its remaining funds, making it the most significant and dire casualty of a governmentwide closure that has now stretched into its fifth week.
Entering the hearing, top officials in the Trump administration had acknowledged that they had billions of dollars left over across multiple federal accounts, including money in an emergency reserve specifically for SNAP. The amounts appeared to total more than would be needed to cover the full costs of providing food stamps if the shutdown continued through November.”
Read more at New York Times.