On Halloween, President Trump announced that, if ordered to by a court, “it will BE MY HONOR” to fund SNAP benefits and feed the 41 million Americans who rely on them.
Turns out … not so much. Instead the Trump administration opted to defy an order by Judge John McConnell, Jr. in Rhode Island to get the money out to hungry Americans.
Specifically, on November 1, the court directed the Department of Agriculture to either tap into a $23 billion reserve fund for Child Nutrition Programs and fully fund November SNAP entitlements, or use $4.6 billion in SNAP reserves to make an immediate partial payment to the states.
The USDA opted to do neither, instead docketing a declaration claiming to have transmitted “revised issuance tables to State agencies,” transferring the obligation to individual states to rejigger and resubmit their own funding requests.
“As is required by Federal law, after receiving notice from FNS, State agencies must recode their eligibility systems to adjust for the reduced maximum allotments,” the government wrote, adding that “For at least some States, USDA’s understanding is that the system changes States must implement to provide the reduced benefit amounts will take anywhere from a few weeks to up to several months.”
Judge McConnell hit the roof. At a hearing on Thursday, he scoffed at the DOJ’s suggestion that it couldn’t possibly tap the Child Nutrition Programs, which are fully funded through June, without starving children. He called the DOJ’s protests “entirely pretextual given the numerous statements made in recent weeks by the president and his administration officials who admit to withholding full SNAP benefits for political reasons.”
He followed up the oral order with a written TRO instructing the USDA to tap the emergency funds immediately. Instead, the administration raced to the First Circuit and demanded immediate relief from “this unprecedented injunction [that] makes a mockery of the separation of powers.” The government requested a ruling by 4 p.m., teeing up yet another request for “emergency relief” at SCOTUS. The states submitted their response, arguing that the trial court did not abuse its discretion when it ordered the government to feed people.
So now it’s on the First Circuit to decide if allowing 41 million people to go hungry is arbitrary and capricious or simply a president virtuously guarding his prerogatives and the federal fisc.
And then it’s on to SCOTUS to see if there are five votes for the theory that separation of powers requires courts to let the president starve people as a tool to bludgeon his political enemies.
As the Founders intended!
Liz Dye lives in Baltimore where she produces the Law and Chaos substack and podcast.
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