Food stamps are set to be paused on Nov. 1 because of the government shutdown.
Some 42 million Americans will not receive benefits through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) until Congress approves new funding, according to federal officials, although some states have taken steps to intervene.
Congress made money available for SNAP for October before failing to reach a new government funding agreement, which resulted in the government shutting down on Oct. 1, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) said in a letter to regional and state SNAP officials.
There is not enough money to pay full SNAP benefits to the approximately 42 million SNAP recipients in November, the USDA says.
“Bottom line, the well has run dry,” the USDA said on Oct. 25.
“At this time, there will be no benefits issued November 01.”
As Ryan McMaken details below, via The Mises Institute, according to the Treasury Department’s report on federal spending for fiscal year 2025, total spending on food stamps—also known as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP)—was $106 billion for the twelve-month period ending September 30. Even in our post-covid age of runaway monetary inflation, 106 billion dollars is still, as they say, “real money,” and SNAP spending doesn’t even include other food-subsidy programs like WIC and school lunch programs.
In spite of much talk about how the Trump administration is supposedly defunding these programs, they’re not going anywhere. For the calendar year of 2025, the US is on pace to see an increase of six to seven billion dollars over 2024’s SNAP spending total of $99.7 billion. This only continues the longer term upward trend in food-stamp spending.
Indeed, since the Great Recession (i.e., 2008), when total SNAP spending was $52 billion, total spending on the program has doubled—even when measured in inflation-adjusted dollars.
Hellbound and Down 