The Trump administration petitioned the Supreme Court on Friday evening to block a lower court’s ruling ordering it to fully fund the food benefits program for hungry Americans by 9:30 p.m, further escalating a legal fight over the key government program on which millions depend.
The request came after the Department of Agriculture, or USDA, moved to distribute food aid for November from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, to 42 million Americans who use them. The benefits have been stalled by the long-running government shutdown.
Some states, including New York, New Jersey and Massachusetts, said they would begin distributing the aid.
In a statement earlier Friday, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul said she had directed state agencies to provide “full federal SNAP benefits for November,” and that she expected the first wave of New Yorkers to have access to those benefits this weekend.
New Jersey announced Friday it has already issued full SNAP benefits to eligible residents on the basis of Thursday’s lower court ruling.
But the Trump administration isn’t done fighting an order from a Rhode Island judge to fully fund the program, despite the shutdown. The petition to the Supreme Court followed the denial of a stay from an appeals court on Friday evening that kept the lower judge’s order in place.
“As explained, the government will be forced to make an irretrievable transfer of billions of dollars by the end of today, absent this Court’s intervention,” wrote U.S. Solicitor General John Sauer to the Supreme Court. “And the harms of that decision will vest this evening, regardless of what this Court ultimately does with respect to the flawed decisions below. An administrative stay is badly needed.”
Technically, the administration must comply with the lower court order by Nov. 7, though it has until 11:59 p.m. While requesting a response from the Supreme Court by 9:30 p.m., the government also acknowledged in its brief that the payments must be made “by the end of today.” If the Supreme Court doesn’t act, the payments would legally have to be made.
The fight over SNAP has moved to the center of the political and legal wrangling over the shutdown, which is approaching its sixth week.
As the court case played out, USDA Under Secretary Patrick Penn told program administrators in a Friday memo that the department had restarted the process of making money available to food stamp recipients by electronic transfers overseen by state agencies.
People have gone without for too long.
U.S. District judge john mcconnell
“People have gone without for too long,” McConnell told government lawyers at a hearing Thursday. “Not making payments to them for even another day is simply unacceptable.”
McConnell strongly rebuked the administration for ignoring his original order to restart payments to recipients, noting they include 16 million children at risk of going hungry.
