New York Senators Kirsten Gillibrand and Chuck Schumer joined with Connecticut Senators Richard Blumenthal and Chris Murphy and 42 other Democrats in the Senate to urge the Trump administration not to follow through on its plan to cut funding for the food nutrition program SNAP on Nov. 1.
The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program is the nation’s largest food assistance program, serving 42 million people, including 16 million children, 8 million seniors, and 4 million people with disabilities.
The senators called on the administration to use the $6 billion contingency fund that already exists in order to continue funding SNAP, which the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) said it will not do. USDA has already notified states not to process SNAP benefits that were due to be paid Nov. 1.
“We were deeply disturbed to hear that the USDA has instructed states to stop processing SNAP benefits for November and were surprised by your recent comments that the program will ‘run out of money in two weeks.’ In fact, the USDA has several tools available which would enable SNAP benefits to be paid through or close to the end of November,” the senators said in a letter to the USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins.
“First, the USDA must, at a minimum under the law, use the contingency funding that is available for SNAP,” the senators said. “Second, the USDA has interchange authority under 7 U.S.C. 2257 that permits the transfer of funds from other USDA nutrition programs. In fact, this authority was recently used by the USDA when it transferred money from child nutrition programs to the WIC account to maintain WIC benefits during the shutdown.”
About 390,000 people receive SNAP benefits in Connecticut while 2.9 million are enrolled in the program in New York state.
“Americans are already struggling with the rising cost of groceries, and they cannot afford a sudden lapse in grocery assistance,” the senators told Rollins.
In a related move, 214 Democrats in the House of Representatives sent a letter to Rollins urging her to release funding for SNAP.
“Choosing not to ensure SNAP benefits reach those in need this November would be a gross dereliction of your responsibilities to the American people,” the House members said.
CNN reported that a post on the USDA’s website had stated that contingency funds would be used to fund SNAP during the government shutdown, but that the message now has been removed. CNN also reported seeing an internal memo that said that states providing their own money to fund SNAP benefits not being funded by the federal government would not be reimbursed.
