For Ashleigh Ligon, a mother of six living in Federal Way, Washington, the defining word for November has been “uncertainty.” Ligon’s household is already marked by the chaos of a large family—her six children include two sets of twins—and the hard work of staying afloat in a society that is not overly accommodating to people with disabilities. She and her husband are both disabled, her adult son has a disability, and her 7-year-old son has severe allergies.
The challenges Ligon faces every day were intensified by the government shutdown, which ended last week after a record-breaking 43 days. She and her family participate in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, which provides food assistance to nearly 42 million low-income Americans. When she heard the news that the Trump administration would not pay out full SNAP benefits for the month of November, Ligon worried how she would keep her family fed.
“I definitely had to eat differently. My children had to eat differently,” said Ligon. “We’ve just been really careful, because there was no way we would get through November [without SNAP benefits].”
Ligon knew she was supposed to receive her SNAP benefits on November 11, meaning that she had some time to plan for the possibility of not getting any assistance. Like millions of Americans, Ligon turned to the charitable sector—but visiting a food pantry simply cannot replace the assistance she receives from SNAP. Ligon’s disability makes it difficult for her to stand for long periods to wait in line. But even after she got to the front of the line, she could not take some of the donated food items because of her son’s severe allergies.
“I left without even the ingredients to make a meal for him, not even one meal. And so while I was grateful for the services that they do offer—I don’t want to sound ungrateful—it’s just not a good fit for my family because of the structure of my family,” she said.
As Washington state was one of the states to pay out full benefits, Ligon was able to receive her SNAP payments on November 11—but only after enduring a period of significant uncertainty the previous week. SNAP benefits are loaded onto a card, which can then be used to purchase food products. On November 6, Ligon’s future benefits registered as “pending,” so she felt comfortable to go to the grocery store and use the rest of her benefits, knowing that she would have more soon.
“There was a lot of stress and a lot of anxiety going into that whole process, to be honest with you, because I was so happy when I heard everyone was getting their benefits. I was like, ‘OK, we can finally eat,’” Ligon recalled. But the next day, she heard about the U.S. Supreme Court order to halt the administration of full benefits. She tried to check on the status of her pending benefits, but the system was down; when she was able to log in between November 8 and November 10, Ligon said, she could only see her available balance, but not any pending balance.
“There’s just a lot of uncertainty and a lot of unknown, which was very stressful, because I had gone grocery shopping once I had seen that those benefits were pending, and I felt secure. And then I felt like my security was kind of ripped from me again,” continued Ligon. “I still made smart decisions in the groceries that I purchased, but it’s not enough. Like, no matter how you cut it, it’s not enough.”
Ligon’s experience of being able to receive full benefits was not universal; several states only offered partial payments to SNAP participants. Others offered none at all. And while the shutdown has ended and benefits are slated to be restored, the disruption will leave scars. What was mere “uncertainty” for a few weeks may spawn something more lasting: a potential long-term impact on how the program is implemented during future shutdowns, and how the stability of SNAP is perceived overall by participants.
This November marked the first time that SNAP benefits have not been distributed during a shutdown. During the second-longest government shutdown, which spanned 35 days from the end of December 2018 through January 2019, the first Trump administration took deliberate steps to ensure SNAP benefits would not lapse. The second Trump administration appears to have different priorities.
In late October, the administration announced that it would not pay the full benefits for the month of November. The Agriculture Department complied with a court order to use a $4.5 billion contingency fund to pay out partial benefits but challenged other lower court rulings to tap into other reserves to fully fund the program. The Supreme Court issued and then extended a short-term order allowing the administration to withhold full payments, allowing time for Congress to reopen the government.
“The Trump administration itself went from understanding that continuing SNAP is part of the responsibilities of governing, to being quite hostile to continuing SNAP, and using this as an excuse to attack the program,” said David Super, professor of law and economics at Georgetown Law School.
For the first two weeks of November, food security for the roughly one in eight Americans who rely on the benefits hung in the balance. According to a tally by the Associated Press, 19 states and the District of Columbia issued full benefits to at least some participants. Many did so in the single day between a lower court ruling that required the federal government to fully fund SNAP and the Supreme Court order granting a stay. But the remaining states either issued partial benefits or did not offer them at all. SNAP participants may have chosen to prioritize buying food over other expenses, which would have long-lasting repercussions for their ability to maintain other needs, such as housing and heat.
“We cut off food assistance to a lot of people with their limited funds, and many of them had to spend their rent money or their utility money buying food for their families, and they can’t pay that back with SNAP,” Super said. “It is certainly possible that there will be long-term disruptions in how people’s budgets are managed, or even people going to extreme measures to avoid getting evicted or getting their utilities shut off because they diverted the money this month.”
Even when the program is fully funded, the average SNAP participant receives around $187 per month, or about $6 per day. Kyshanna Patman, a mother of four living in Lexington, North Carolina, who participates in SNAP, said that she usually runs out of benefits by the third week of the month. By that time, she often has to choose to go without to ensure her children have enough.
“There are times when I probably won’t eat at all, just to make sure they’ve got [food],” said Patman.
Her family receives supplemental security income because two of her children are disabled; at the end of the month, Patman will sometimes use that money to buy groceries. In the days before the disruption to SNAP, Patman worried about how she would handle everyday costs when her family is already struggling.
“I still have to pay bills, and I still have to use money for transportation to get them back and forth to school and things like that. So for us to not be able to have it anymore, it will really be a hard thing,” Patman said in an interview at the end of October.
North Carolina only provided partial payments to SNAP recipients in November. When reached by text on November 13, Patman said that her family had already used the partial SNAP benefits they had received this month. The North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services planned to issue full benefits by November 14.
When SNAP participants have access to full benefits again, they will be able to stock up on items they need. This could help the small grocers who felt the impact of the disruption to SNAP. The National Grocers Association warned earlier in November that the lapse in funding could lead to “reduced employee hours, perishable food losses, and declining sales for many community grocers across our nation.”
But the difficulties faced by SNAP participants at the beginning of the month could be a harbinger of pending challenges. The Trump administration has repeatedly targeted SNAP, and the president has indicated that he will continue to take aim at the program even after the end of the shutdown.
Congress also passed legislation over the summer that could result in millions losing their benefits across the country. States were instructed to begin implementing a provision to tighten work requirements in November, and the shutdown added to the logistical challenges for state governments.
“States have been in chaos for the last several weeks. They’ve been fielding questions from people about where their benefits are, and at a time when states ought to be engaging in careful evaluations to see who is subject to the three-month time limit and who has enough hours of work or is unable to work,” said Super.
Another provision of the law would force states to shoulder some of the cost of SNAP benefits depending on their error rate—the percentage of over- or underpayments in a state—which may lead them to either spend less on SNAP or further restrict benefits in future years. If state officials have been distracted with handling the shutdown, this could lead to more errors once SNAP is fully up and running. Moreover, the continuing resolution that funds the government has authorized SNAP spending through next year, but that may just mean the next political fight over the program has been punted until 2026.
Participating in SNAP already has its challenges. Ligon is frustrated by the time-consuming requirement to verify her family’s information every six months, a process that always seems to be accompanied by some sort of administrative error that can only be ironed out when she speaks with a supervisor. Even with her benefits, she has to occasionally make difficult decisions, such as choosing not to eat meat so her kids will have enough protein. She will buy more processed items and frozen fruits and vegetables because fresh produce is more expensive.
Still, SNAP is incredibly important to Ligon’s family, and she worries about the impact of future cuts even after the government is reopened and benefits are more secure. The disruption of the shutdown has made her less confident about her family’s future.
“Things that I couldn’t imagine happening are happening, and things that they say could never happen, happened,” said Ligon.
