Alliance Alert:The Alliance for Rights and Recovery continues to closely monitor the SNAP funding crisis as the federal government shutdown enters its fourth week and threatens to halt food assistance for millions of Americans in November.
We strongly support the multi-state lawsuit filed by New York Attorney General Letitia James and 24 other states challenging the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s refusal to use available emergency contingency funds to sustain the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). These funds—totaling at least $5–6 billion—were created precisely to maintain essential benefits during times of crisis and uncertainty.
As millions of families, children, seniors, and individuals with disabilities face the prospect of losing access to food assistance, this lawsuit represents a necessary and principled defense of the nation’s largest anti-hunger program. Litigation has once again become a vital tool for states to defend their residents from harmful federal decisions, ensuring that critical supports like SNAP remain in place.
The Alliance urges the USDA to immediately release emergency contingency funds to prevent hunger and disruption of services, and we call on Congress to act quickly to end the shutdown before more lives are affected. Access to food is a basic human right, and no one should go hungry due to political gridlock in Washington.
25 States Sue Trump Admin Over Withholding Food Aid Funding
By Grace Yarrow | Politico | October 28, 2025
Democratic attorneys general and governors from 25 states sued the Trump administration Tuesday over its conclusion that it cannot tap emergency funds to keep food aid flowing for millions of Americans next month.
Officials — including those from California, New York, Massachusetts and the District of Columbia — argued that USDA violated federal law by planning to suspend benefits under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, the nation’s largest anti-hunger program serving nearly 42 million people. The department’s actions, they claim, will delay SNAP benefits for the first time in the program’s history.
The lawsuit, which was filed in a federal court in Massachusetts, asks the judge to overturn the administration’s earlier directives instructing states to withhold benefits and require USDA to use all available funds to keep SNAP benefits flowing in November.
“USDA’s action to suspend benefits where there are federal funds that Congress has appropriated and that are available for these benefits threatens to fundamentally undermine” trust in the program, the filing states. “It is states that operate SNAP on the ground and are forced into the position of trying to explain to needy, hungry people … why they will not be receiving the benefits they have been promised.”
POLITICO reported Monday that the state leaders were planning to file the lawsuit today.
The expected SNAP funding cliff will hit families right before the holiday season, when food banks and anti-hunger organizations typically experience higher demand. The push to fund food aid programs, like SNAP and another one serving low-income women and infants, has become a sticking point on Capitol Hill, as lawmakers struggle to find a solution amid the fifth week of the government shutdown.
The plaintiffs are disputing the Trump administration’s statements that it doesn’t have the legal authority to use the $5 billion it has in emergency funds to pay for at least part of SNAP, which requires more than $8 billion to pay for November benefits. They also argue that USDA could tap Section 32 funds, which it did to tide over the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, to fully fund SNAP next month.
Many of the attorneys general involved in the lawsuit also wrote to Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins on Friday asking the department to provide a legal explanation for the SNAP delays and possible options to intervene before the program is halted.
“We are approaching an inflection point for Senate Democrats,” USDA spokesperson Alec Varsamis said in a statement Tuesday following the lawsuit’s filing. “Continue to hold out for the Far-Left wing of the party or reopen the government so mothers, babies, and the most vulnerable among us can receive timely WIC and SNAP allotments.”
NY Joins Lawsuit Seeking to Force USDA to Fund SNAP Benefits
By Esther Sun | Times Union | October 28, 2025
ALBANY — New York has joined a coalition of states suing the U.S. Department of Agriculture seeking to force the federal government to provide funding for a federally subsidized food assistance program that is set to stop Saturday as the federal government shutdown enters its fourth week.
Announced Tuesday by New York Attorney General Letitia James, who is pursuing the case alongside 24 other states and the District of Columbia, the lawsuit challenges the USDA’s decision to refrain from issuing November benefits for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which provides low-income individuals and families monthly payments to help buy food. The states allege the move violates federal law because the agency has access to at least $6 billion in contingency funds that are meant to be used “exactly for this purpose.”
SNAP, which provides benefits to more than 42 million people nationwide, provided roughly $650 million to 3 million New York residents each month in fiscal year 2025.
In a Friday memo, the USDA contends that its contingency funds cannot be used in to offset the shutdown because they are “only available to supplement regular monthly benefits when amounts have been appropriated for, but are insufficient to cover, benefits.” House Speaker Mike Johnson reiterated that statement at a Monday news conference.
And in an announcement posted Sunday on its website, the USDA attributed the funding gap to Senate Democrats as the politically charged battle in Congress continues over the spending bill needed to reopen the government continues, saying the country is “reaching an inflection point” and “the well has run dry.”
New York Republicans also argued that Democrats in Congress, including those from New York, are to blame.
“Their reckless decision to block a clean funding bill has left 42 million Americans — including children, seniors, and working families — at risk of losing their November food benefits, just in time for Thanksgiving,” New York Republican Party Chair Edward F. Cox said in a statement Sunday.
The move is a departure from President Donald J. Trump’s administration’s previous statements that it would use contingency funds to continue providing benefits. A funding lapse plan prior to October stated that, “congressional intent is evident that SNAP’s operations should continue since the program has been provided with multi-year contingency funds” that can be used during a shutdown.
The attorneys general pursuing the case contend that the suspension violates two federal laws: the Food and Nutrition Act, which created SNAP, and the Administrative Procedure Act, which governs how federal agencies make rules. They are seeking a temporary court order forcing the USDA to use contingency funds for November benefits for plaintiff states.
New York, states sue USDA for pausing SNAP amid government shutdown