PROVIDENCE, R.I.—A federal judge delivered a sharp, decisive rebuke to the Trump administration late Thursday, ordering the government to fully fund food assistance benefits for more than 42 million low-income Americans by Friday, ending a contentious battle over federal food aid amid the ongoing government shutdown.
U.S. District Judge John J. McConnell Jr. granted a request from a coalition of cities and nonprofits, compelling the administration to release the full amount for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) for November. The ruling overturned the administration’s plan to issue only partial benefits, a move the judge characterized as an unacceptable failure to consider the humanitarian consequences.
The Ruling: Full Funding, Swift Action
Judge McConnell’s order is the culmination of a week-long legal fight after the administration initially declared it would suspend all SNAP benefits due to the lapse in Congressional appropriations. Two prior judicial rulings forced the government to use an existing emergency contingency fund, but the administration subsequently announced it would only cover about 65% of the maximum benefit, arguing it lacked the legal authority to tap other accounts.
Judge McConnell passionately disagreed, arguing that the administration was causing “irreparable harm” to vulnerable populations.
“The defendants failed to consider the practical consequences associated with this decision to only partially fund SNAP,” Judge McConnell said in his ruling. “They knew that there would be a long delay in paying partial SNAP payments and failed to consider the harms individuals who rely on those benefits would suffer. This should never happen in America.”
The judge also suggested the administration had delayed the process for political leverage in the shutdown fight.
Leveraging Hunger for Political Gain?
Attorneys for the plaintiffs explicitly accused the administration of playing politics with the social safety net, telling the court: “What defendants are really trying to do is to leverage people’s hunger to gain partisan political advantage in the shutdown fight.”
The judge cited statements made by President Trump earlier this week, in which he appeared to link the release of the food aid to a resolution of the government shutdown.
The administration’s defense—that using other funds, such as the Section 32 account typically reserved for child nutrition programs, would lead to an “unprecedented and significant shortfall”—was dismissed by the court. Judge McConnell ruled the government must utilize the combination of the contingency fund and other available, previously appropriated funds to meet the total $8.5 billion to $9 billion required for a full month’s allotment.
The Looming Deadline
While the court order mandates the payment be released to the states by Friday, the millions of Americans who rely on the debit-like cards for groceries may still face delays. State agencies and vendors must now restart and process the payments for the 42 million beneficiaries—a process that experts warn could still take days or weeks.
The order, which the Trump administration swiftly filed a notice of appeal against, marks a rare and powerful legal intervention into the administrative decisions being made in the unprecedented, protracted government shutdown, forcing the White House to prioritize the nation’s nutritional safety net over political strategy.