Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson issued a temporary stay Friday on a lower court order that would have required the Trump administration to immediately provide full federal food benefits to approximately 42 million Americans enrolled in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.
The administrative stay, while temporary in nature, provides the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit additional time to consider whether the Trump administration merits longer-term emergency relief as the legal dispute over SNAP payments proceeds through the appeals process.
Justice Jackson’s intervention came as the Trump administration approached a district court deadline to cover food assistance payments in full for November and allocate roughly $4 billion from other nutrition programs to meet that obligation. The district court judge had set an end-of-day Friday deadline for compliance.
In her brief order, Justice Jackson stated that the administrative stay will “facilitate the First Circuit’s expeditious resolution” of the administration’s request for a longer pause. She directed the appeals court to resolve the pending motion “with dispatch.”
The legal battle centers on the administration’s assertion that it has depleted a contingency reserve fund exceeding $5 billion, which proved sufficient only for partial food assistance payments this month. The administration contends that meeting the full $4 billion shortfall would necessitate drawing from funds designated for Child Nutrition Programs.
Solicitor General D. John Sauer argued in the Supreme Court filing that such a reallocation would pose significant risks. “Pulling billions of dollars from the Child Nutrition Programs would jeopardize those programs’ ability to fully operate this year — putting at risk critical food-assistance initiatives relied upon by millions of children every day, and raiding a program that Congress did fund to instead extend one that Congress has not funded,” Sauer wrote.
Earlier Friday, a Department of Agriculture official had notified states that the agency was working to comply with the district court’s order to provide full food benefits to Americans enrolled in SNAP.
The dispute arose from the ongoing government shutdown, which led the Department of Agriculture to announce late last month that November assistance payments would not be distributed. That announcement prompted a lawsuit from a coalition of cities and nonprofit organizations concerned that millions of low-income Americans would face food insecurity.
U.S. District Judge John McConnell, overseeing the case, ordered the Trump administration to utilize contingency funds to provide food aid to the approximately 42 million Americans enrolled in the program for November.
The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program serves as a cornerstone of federal food assistance, enabling recipients to purchase groceries. The program’s temporary disruption has raised concerns among advocates for low-income families, while the administration maintains that proper funding channels must be respected to avoid jeopardizing other critical nutrition programs serving children.
The First Circuit Court of Appeals now faces the task of quickly determining whether the Trump administration’s concerns about depleting child nutrition funds warrant a longer stay of the district court’s order while the underlying legal questions are resolved.
