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hunger
'A Devastating Gut Punch': New Trump-GOP Cuts to Food Aid Take Effect Amid High Grocery Prices
"This is a plan to wreck state SNAP programs and push millions off of SNAP and into hunger."
Oct 05, 2026
The Republican budget package that President Donald Trump signed into law last summer included a change requiring states to fund a larger portion of the costs of administering the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which provides food aid to tens of millions of Americans.
That change, which advocates and experts warned would impose unsustainable burdens on some states and potentially result in more cuts to food aid, took effect late last week, amid a nationwide affordability crisis that has forced many Americans to turn to food banks and other sources of support to meet their families' needs.
Katie Bergh, a food policy expert at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP), explained that—under the Trump-GOP budget law—"every state now gets half as many federal dollars to ensure SNAP gets to eligible families on time and in the right amount."
"Some states didn't increase state funding to make up for this federal funding cut, which could lead to staff shortages, backlogs, and low-income families waiting months for help," Bergh warned. "Other states and counties are weighing property tax increases or cuts to other services to fill the gap."
CBPP has estimated that more than 5 million people, including more than a million children, have lost SNAP since Trump signed the Republican budget measure into law last year.
Rep. Shontel Brown (D-Ohio) condemned the newly implemented SNAP changes in a statement, noting that Trump and the Republican Party have created new work requirements—and thus new bureaucratic burdens for states and aid recipients—while also slashing administrative funding, a potentially disastrous combination.
"It’s a devastating gut punch and it’s intentional," said Brown. "This is a plan to wreck state SNAP programs and push millions off of SNAP and into hunger."
The Food Research & Action Center estimated in a recent analysis that the new cost burden for states "ranges from $3 million in Wyoming to $168 million in New York."
"States are being asked to administer a more complicated program with fewer federal resources. That is not an efficiency strategy. It is a fiscal transfer," the group said. "Ultimately, this policy does not simply affect state agencies. It affects every family waiting for an application to be processed, every community experiencing rising food insecurity, and every state budget attempting to balance growing needs with fewer available resources."
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1 in 5 Children in Lebanon Facing Daily Hunger Due to Israeli Assault: UNICEF
After more than six months, 329,000 people in Lebanon remain displaced from their homes by Israel's occupation, one-third of whom are children.
Sep 30, 2026
Israel's latest assault on Lebanon is inflicting widespread hunger, death, and injury on children across the country, according to a report out Wednesday from the United Nations Children's Fund.
Children go to bed hungry in at least one in five households, according to a survey conducted by UNICEF in July, while nearly a third are going without needed healthcare because their families are unable to afford it. Four in five households, the report says, have found it harder to afford basic necessities.
Nearly 17,000 people have been killed or injured since March. Among them are 261 children who've been killed and 1,056 who've been injured—and 12% of those injured now live with a disability.
Around 100,000 children are at risk of losing access to education. At least 436 schools have been damaged across the country, including 37 that were completely destroyed.
“Children and young people in Lebanon are being asked to bear a burden no child should have to carry,” said UNICEF Lebanon Representative Marcoluigi Corsi, who noted the report's finding that 770,000 children have suffered psychological distress over the past six months due to repeated exposure to violence, loss, and displacement.
Lebanon was already in the midst of an economic crisis that left many families poor. But the situation has grown markedly more severe since March, when Israel launched an ongoing occupation of southern Lebanon that has displaced more than 1.1 million people and unleashed punishing airstrikes across the country, including in densely populated civilian areas.
More than 329,000 of those displaced have yet to go home, and around one-third are children. Despite a ceasefire announced in April, Israeli officials have said that those ordered to leave their homes will not be allowed to return until they deem northern Israel "safe" from attacks by the militant group Hezbollah.
Israeli forces have systematically razed dozens of villages and farms in southern Lebanon, destroying tens of thousands of homes. As Al Jazeera reported earlier this week, Israel has predominantly demolished Shia villages while telling Christian villages they'll be spared so long as they stay neutral.
According to a June report by Amnesty International, about 6% of Lebanese territory is effectively under a "don't come back" order from Israel with residents barred indefinitely from returning home. Amnesty said the forced displacement and prevention of return in parts of southern Lebanon constitute unlawful transfer, a war crime.
Some Israeli leaders have discussed annexing the occupied portion of Lebanon and moving in Israeli settlers.
Earlier this week, Bezalel Smotrich—the Israeli finance minister who has overseen a historic surge of violent settlement expansion in the West Bank—said that he would "very much like to annex at least… up to the Litani [River] in Lebanon," extending the country's border into southern Lebanon.
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‘Obviously Going to Increase Hunger’: Trump SNAP Cuts Imperil Free School Meals for Millions of Kids
"Without congressional action to reverse the SNAP cuts, children will lose critical food benefits that help families keep hunger at bay."
Sep 04, 2026
Millions of children across the United States are at risk of losing access to free school meals due to the unprecedented federal nutrition aid cuts that President Donald Trump signed into law last summer.
The 2025 Republican budget law enacted the largest cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) since its inception more than six decades ago. The cuts have already pushed SNAP enrollment to its lowest level in 17 years, with roughly five million people—including 1.5 million kids—losing aid. Because school districts across the US use SNAP participation rolls to automatically sign children up for free school meals, kids who lose federal aid are at risk of also losing access to free school-time meals.
“Cuts to SNAP are not going to stop at the grocery store,” Clarissa Hayes, deputy director of child nutrition programs and policy at the Food Research & Action Center (FRAC), told Stateline earlier this week. “They really are going to threaten children’s access to school meals, which is obviously going to increase hunger at home and in the classroom, and is going to have that negative ripple effect across children’s health and academic performance.”
FRAC estimated in a recent report that a record 55,362 schools nationwide "offered breakfast and lunch to all their students through the Community Eligibility Provision (CEP)" during the 2025-2026 school year.
But the number of children who are directly certified for free school meals determines schools' eligibility for CEP as well as the federal reimbursement schools receive under the program, meaning huge declines in SNAP participation could result in schools losing eligibility for CEP or leave them unable to afford it.
Students who are no longer automatically enrolled in free school meal programs will have to apply, an often confusing process that requires family income documentation and other paperwork hurdles.
“Without congressional action to reverse the SNAP cuts, children will lose critical food benefits that help families keep hunger at bay, and the progress we have made on Healthy School Meals for All could unravel,” said Crystal FitzSimons, the president of FRAC, which estimates that nearly 28 million children attended a CEP school during the 2025-2026 school year.
A survey released last month by the No Kid Hungry campaign found that close to 60% of parents said "their child wouldn’t have enough to eat if it weren’t for the meals they receive during the school day," underscoring the potentially devastating impact of a large-scale loss of access to school breakfast, lunch, and snacks.
"An overwhelming majority (89%) indicate that school meals take some pressure off their family when it comes to feeding their children," the campaign said.
Democratic members of Congress are increasingly sounding the alarm over the 2025 GOP budget law's impact on school meals as the new school year begins.
US Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.) wrote in a letter to the US Department of Agriculture last week that "no child should lose access to breakfast or lunch at school because a parent was unable to satisfy a new bureaucratic requirement for food assistance."
"And no school should be forced to jeopardize its meal program because federal policy has made it harder to identify children who qualify for assistance," Krishnamoorthi added.
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Trump-GOP Budget Law Pushes SNAP Enrollment to 17-Year Low as Millions Lose Aid
"These cuts are not filtering out 'waste, fraud, and abuse'... they are parents deciding between paying the electric bill and putting food on the table, or skipping meals."
Aug 26, 2026
Participation in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program is now at its lowest point in 17 years thanks to cuts made in the Republican Party's One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
The Center for Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) on Wednesday published the latest update to its series of reports tracking the impact of SNAP cuts, and it found that there are roughly 5 million fewer people participating in SNAP thanks in large part to the cuts made in the 2025 GOP budget law.
Since the law's passage, enrollment in SNAP has decreased in every US state except Alaska.
While enrollment has fallen by an average of 12% across the US over the last year, eight states have seen participation plummet by 20% or higher. Arizona has seen the largest overall drop in participation, with 45% fewer people enrolled in the program over the last year.
"The declines started before the harmful 2025 Republican reconciliation law’s enactment, suggesting factors at play in addition to that law," CBPP explained. "But in almost all states, declines in SNAP participation accelerated after the 2025 Republican reconciliation law, and we expect that trend to continue."
CBPP also projected participation would fall even further in the next year given that the biggest changes made to SNAP funding won't fully kick in until 2027, when "most states will have to pay between 5% and 15% of SNAP benefit costs, totaling hundreds of millions of dollars a year in many states."
"The amount a state will have to pay will be based on current error rates, factoring in errors that states are making today," CBPP emphasized. "The magnitude of the cost shift and the urgency surrounding error rates may incentivize states to take drastic measures to reduce their payment error rates quickly and cut program costs, even if it means delaying or improperly denying benefits to eligible people."
CBPP's latest report on SNAP cuts comes after ParentsTogether Action released a survey of SNAP beneficiaries on Tuesday finding that two-thirds of families who rely on the program have already seen benefits decrease over the last year.
The survey shows 75% of SNAP beneficiaries also report that affording food is one of their biggest economic challenges, echoing earlier surveys showing that buying groceries has become a major source of stress for Americans overall.
SNAP recipients described to ParentsTogether Action how the SNAP cuts have impacted their finances.
"They took over $120 off our SNAP," said a Kansas mother named Brandi. "We have a hard time keeping up with bills. I get [Supplemental Security Income], and that is my only income for my daughter and myself."
An Oregon woman named Amanda, meanwhile, described seeing her benefits cut by more than half after she found a job.
"We were receiving $400 a month, but after I reported my new income and reapplied, our benefits dropped to just under $200," she said. "We also didn’t receive any benefits for one month during the process."
Ailen Arreaza, executive director of ParentsTogether Action, said the SNAP cuts are forcing families to make an "impossible choice" on whether to prioritize paying for food, healthcare, or their utility bills.
"These cuts are not filtering out 'waste, fraud, and abuse' like the administration would like us to believe," Arreaza explained, "they are parents deciding between paying the electric bill and putting food on the table, or skipping meals so their kids can eat. Families should not have to make these choices."
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'Freezers Are Getting Empty': Food Banks Struggle to Meet Demand as Trump SNAP Cuts Wreak Havoc
"We are feverishly fundraising and talking to the board about the need to provide grants, but in reality, we are limited," said the executive director of the Central Illinois Food Bank.
Aug 14, 2026
Food banks across the US, from New Mexico to Oregon to Illinois, are seeing massive increases in demand as the unprecedented federal nutrition aid cuts that President Donald Trump signed into law last summer take hold, stripping benefits from millions of Americans amid elevated grocery costs—a recipe for disaster.
"Our freezers are getting empty," Eddie Nelson, the manager of a food bank in Dallas, Oregon, told an Oregon Public Broadcasting reporter earlier this week. The outlet noted that the line for the food bank "stretches out the door and around the corner at the end of the month, when federal food stamp benefits dry up and families struggle to fill their pantries."
An estimated 4.5 million people, including roughly 1.5 million children, have lost Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits since the Trump-GOP budget law took effect last year, enshrining around $200 billion in cuts—the largest in the program's history—as well as new work reporting requirements that are expected to put millions more at risk of losing aid.
The large-scale loss of benefits and expectations of even more hardship in the near future have heavily strained local food banks.
Pam Molitoris, executive director of the Central Illinois Food Bank, said during a panel discussion last month that his organization "cannot absorb" the damage from the federal nutrition cuts, noting that "we are one meal to every nine meals provided by SNAP."
"We are feverishly fundraising and talking to the board about the need to provide grants, but in reality, we are limited," said Molitoris.
Roadrunner Food Bank in Albuquerque, New Mexico said it has seen a massive increase in demand this year as the combination of aid cuts and a worsening cost-of-living crisis forces families to seek out charities for assistance. More than 18,000 people lost SNAP benefits in New Mexico between July 2025 and April 2026, according to a tracker maintained by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
“You could look at it like SNAP is the first line of defense against food insecurity in our country; food banks are the last line of defense," Jason Riggs, Roadrunner's director of advocacy, said earlier this week. "So the idea is we need both."
Feeding America, a nonprofit network of hundreds of food banks, says the Trump-GOP cuts to SNAP equate to up to 9 billion meals lost per year—"more than the entire Feeding America network of food banks, meal programs, and church pantries provided last year."
In the face of growing evidence of the damage their cuts have inflicted on communities across the US, Republican lawmakers have shown no inclination to seriously mitigate the impacts—much less reverse the funding reductions. GOP senators are currently working to advance a farm bill that would only delay for one year the Republican budget law's potentially catastrophic shift of a significant portion of SNAP costs to states.
Earlier this month, the Republican farm legislation failed to advance out of committee due to Democratic opposition and the absence of Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).
"While it is a step in the right direction to give states more time to implement the benefit cost-share, increasing the SNAP cost for states in exchange for a one year delay only increases the unprecedented burden on states. Children will suffer as a result," said George Kelemen, senior vice president of the No Kid Hungry campaign. "Already, 4.5 million people, including over a million kids, have lost access to SNAP over the past year."
"Those families are now missing out on the nutritious food SNAP provides," Kelemen added, "and sadly that number will only grow under this proposal."
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Nearly 50 Million More People to Face 'Massive Threat' of Acute Hunger Due to El Niño, UN Warns
Countries in Central America and southern Africa are expected to be hardest hit by El Niño this year, according to the United Nations World Food Program.
Aug 05, 2026
The United Nations World Food Program on Wednesday warned that close to 50 million more people across the world are facing the prospect of acute hunger due to the El Niño climate pattern that has emerged this summer.
By the end of the year, the WFP projects that 49 million more people could be unable to meet their daily food needs thanks to El Niño, which features warmer than average temperatures in the Pacific Ocean and can cause an increase in extreme weather.
Countries in Central America and southern Africa are expected to be hardest hit by El Niño this year. According to WFP's analysis, southern African nations are "particularly exposed because many households depend on rain-fed subsistence agriculture," while nations in Latin America and the Caribbean "could see one of the sharpest rises in food insecurity, with more than 16 million people affected."
"El Niño is a massive threat to the food security of millions who are already vulnerable," said Carl Skau, acting executive director of the WFP. "The sooner we help families to prepare for these climate shocks, the greater our ability to save lives and protect livelihoods."
WFP said it's boosting its hunger prevention efforts in eight countries that are particularly at risk, noting that it has already "triggered anticipatory action plans in South Sudan, Chad, Mauritania, Uganda, Guatemala, and El Salvador, providing more than $14 million in lifesaving responses to support half a million people."
Celeste Saulo, secretary-general of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), warned in June that El Niño "will exacerbate drought and heavy rainfall and increase the risk of heatwaves both on land and in the ocean."
While El Niño is a recurring phenomenon, a Wednesday report in The Guardian noted that "its impacts and strength are being strongly affected by the climate crisis," with meteorological experts saying it could lead to the hottest year on record in 2027.
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Trump USDA Chief Calls Kicking 5 Million People Off Food Aid 'A Pretty Big Win'
"The immense hardship these families are now facing is not, in fact, 'a pretty big win,'" said one policy expert.
Aug 05, 2026
US Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins bragged on Tuesday that the Trump administration has now "moved 5 million people off food stamps," an outcome that she hailed as a significant victory even amid mounting reports of families with children struggling to afford groceries after losing federal assistance.
"For those of us that love work and celebrate work and want people to work and not be on food stamps, it’s a pretty big win," Rollins said during an event in Minnesota, referring to the massive reduction in Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) enrollment since passage of the 2025 Republican budget law, which enacted the largest food aid cuts in US history and expanded SNAP work requirements.
The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP), a liberal think tank, has estimated that more than 4.5 million people have lost SNAP benefits since President Donald Trump signed the GOP budget package into law last summer. That total includes at least 1.5 million children.
Rollins: "For those who love work and celebrate work and want people to work and not be on food stamps, it's a pretty big win when we've moved 5 million people off food stamps, y'all." pic.twitter.com/kUrqVrvahI
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) August 4, 2026
Contrary to Rollins' claim that people are moving off SNAP because they found strong employment, CBPP noted in a recent analysis that "unemployment nationwide has been flat at about 4 percent since July 2025."
"At best, it’s down in 13 states and the District of Columbia by less than 1 percentage point," the think tank observed. "It’s very unlikely that reduced need is driving the decline in SNAP participation."
Katie Bergh, a senior policy analyst at CBPP, responded to Rollins' latest boast about large-scale loss of SNAP benefits by pointing to a July New York Times story featuring Dee McDonald, a cancer survivor and caregiver of three kids who recently lost federal assistance.
"The immense hardship these families are now facing is not, in fact, 'a pretty big win,'" Bergh wrote on social media.
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World Famine Authorities Warn Most Gazans Still Suffering 'Crisis'-Level Hunger
"The October 2025 ceasefire has led to measurable gains in humanitarian access and overall conditions across the Gaza Strip. However, the situation remains deeply fragile."
Jul 23, 2026
Although the Gaza Strip is no longer officially enduring famine, a majority of Palestinians there are suffering "crisis or worse" levels of hunger in an emergency that is expected to worsen in the coming months if Israel's bombardment and siege—which many experts say is a key component of an ongoing genocide—continue.
The Integrated Phase Food Security Classification—which ranks food security levels on a scale of 1 to 5—on Thursday published an analysis showing that from mid-April to the end of June, more than 1.2 million people, or 59% of Gaza’s population, were experiencing IPC Phase 3 (crisis) or worse levels of food insecurity. This included about 212,000 people in IPC Phase 4 (emergency). All five Gaza governorates were classified as being in Phase 3.
"After two years of conflict, the October 2025 ceasefire has led to measurable gains in humanitarian access and overall conditions across the Gaza Strip," IPC said in a statement. "However, the situation remains deeply fragile, with civilians continuing to endure harsh conditions."
#Gaza Strip The Oct 2025 ceasefire has led to measurable gains in humanitarian access & conditions across the Gaza Strip, yet the situation remains deeply fragile. 1.4 million people are facing high levels of acute food insecurity through Dec 2026. More: www.ipcinfo.org/ipcinfo-webs...
[image or embed]
— The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (@theipcinfo.bsky.social) July 23, 2026 at 5:43 AM
This marks an improvement from a year ago, when a "worst-case scenario" was developing into a Phase 5 (catastrophe) famine that was formally declared by the IPC in August 2025. At least hundreds of Palestinians, many of them children, have died from malnutrition since Israel launched its US-backed war on Gaza in retaliation for the Hamas-led attack of October 7, 2023.
The IPC declared last December that while Gaza was no longer in a famine, the situation remained critical for the war-ravaged Palestinians there. The new IPC report warns that two-thirds of Gaza's population are projected to face Phase 3 crisis conditions by the end of the year.
The organization also said that 74,200 Palestinian children under the age of 5 in Gaza will likely need treatment for acute malnutrition through next April.
(Image by Integrated Phase Food Security Classification)
Responding to the new IPC data, United Nations Children's Fund Executive Director Catherine Russell said Thursday that “acute malnutrition has fallen, but many children are still going hungry, and some children may never fully recover from prolonged lack of proper nutrition."
"This progress shows that when humanitarian access improves and aid gets through, children can be pulled back from the brink," she added. "But it rests on a supplementary feeding program that doesn’t reach all children, and where funding is running out."
Israeli forces have killed or wounded more than 250,000 Palestinians since then, and forcibly displaced, starved, or sickened over 2 million others since then, resulting in worldwide allegations of genocide embodied in an International Court of Justice case filed by South Africa at the end of 2023 and now formally supported by nearly 20 nations.
Leading global famine experts accused Israel of deliberately starving Palestinians in Gaza. The International Criminal Court arrest warrants issued in late 2024 for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant, his former defense minister who ordered the "complete siege" of Gaza, accuse the pair of crimes against humanity and war crimes, including murder and forced starvation.
Like many members of their public, Israeli and US officials under both the Biden and Trump administrations initially denied that Israel was starving Gazans. However, Israeli officials warned in private that Gaza was facing starvation, while US President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance, and other administration figures have acknowledged that Palestinians were starving to death in the strip. That did not stop them from continuing to give billions of dollars in US armed aid to Israel.
In response to the new IPC report, acting United Nations World Food Program Executive Director Carl Skau said that “there is progress on food security in Gaza, but it is fragile and can easily be reversed."
"The overall humanitarian situation remains brutal: Families lack water, sanitation, and medicine," Skau added. "We need sustained access, funding, and stability so people of Gaza can begin recovery.”
The heads of various United Nations agencies concurred that a lasting peace—which Israel is not allowing as it continues bombing and besieging Gaza despite a nominal nine-month ceasefire—is imperative for that recovery.
“Food security in Gaza cannot recover unless local food production starts again and farmers, herders, fishers, and other producers can rebuild their livelihoods,” UN Food and Agriculture Organization Director-General Qu Dongyu said on Thursday. “Producers need access to farmland and the sea, and to seeds, tools, livestock supplies, and other agricultural inputs, as well as technical support."
"Restrictions on agricultural imports and humanitarian supplies must be lifted," Qu added. "Without these essentials, food production, and security will remain a pressing situation."
The IPC said that "recent gains remain fragile," and that "advancing peace plans is essential to support recovery, enable the safe return of displaced populations, and help households rebuild their livelihoods."
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'Grotesque and Indefensible': At Least 1.5 Million Kids Have Lost Food Aid Under GOP Budget Law
"The damage from the SNAP cuts could worsen quickly as some states are considering ending their SNAP programs entirely as soon as October 2027," warned one expert.
Jul 22, 2026
At least 1.5 million children have lost Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits since US President Donald Trump signed the Republican budget package into law last summer, enacting the largest cuts to federal food aid in the nation's history.
The new estimate of food aid loss among children comes from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP), which said Tuesday that SNAP participation was down by over 4.5 million people overall between July 2025 and April 2026. Refuting the Trump administration's narrative, the liberal think tank emphasized that the unemployment rate nationwide has been roughly flat since last July, meaning it is "very unlikely that reduced need is driving the decline in SNAP participation."
Arizona has seen the most staggering decline in SNAP participation. It has fallen 48% overall and 49% among children in the state since enactment of the Trump-GOP budget law, which instituted new work-reporting requirements for some recipients and punishments for states with elevated payment error rates. Under Republican law, states will for the first time have to pay a portion of SNAP benefit costs, which previously were fully covered by the federal government.
"Grotesque and indefensible," policy analyst Michael Linden wrote in response to the new data, noting that the Republican budget law slashed taxes for wealthy households while decimating SNAP.
Earlier this week, The New York Times published a report detailing the horror show residents have experienced as they've attempted to reenroll in SNAP after improperly losing benefits due to bureaucratic chaos stemming from the GOP law.
As states have raced to limit the massive new costs they will soon face under the law's cost shift, many eligible families are losing SNAP because they can’t navigate new bureaucratic obstacles & understaffed states can’t keep up with the added paperwork. https://t.co/DOCI3axDed pic.twitter.com/8OzMUpkLc7
— Katie Bergh (@Katie_Bergh) July 21, 2026
Sharon Parrott, CBPP's president, said Tuesday that the consequences of the massive SNAP cuts—totaling around $200 billion over the next decade—have been "stark: an ill grandmother raising teens can’t get her SNAP reinstated despite being eligible, and parents are skipping meals to save food for their children. Families who have had their food assistance taken away are turning to overburdened food banks, which cannot fill the gap."
" House Republicans are looking past this emergency in their budget legislation—while using it to help farmers struggling with high costs due to Trump’s tariffs and oil prices driven up by the war in Iran," said Parrott, referring to the GOP's new reconciliation package.
"The damage from the SNAP cuts could worsen quickly as some states are considering ending their SNAP programs entirely as soon as October 2027, when the cost shift takes effect. States unable or unwilling to pay the costs they incur will have no choice but to end the program," Parrott warned. "People across the US consistently say they want Washington to focus on affordability, especially the cost of food. Mitigating last year’s cuts to SNAP and staunching the number of families and children losing SNAP would be a good place to start."
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‘Frankly Sickening’: Reports Highlight Brutal Impact of Trump-GOP Cuts to Food Aid
"States are absolutely contemplating a world in which SNAP isn’t available."
Jul 21, 2026
Several reports published this week highlight the brutal impact cuts made to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program in Republicans' 2025 budget law are having on Americans' access to food.
A lengthy Tuesday report in The New York Times zeroed in on the bill's impact in Arizona, where roughly 440,000 people have been dropped from the program even though many of them are still eligible to receive assistance.
The GOP-passed One Big Beautiful Bill Act established severe penalties for states that have high error rates when awarding SNAP benefits, and Arizona has responded by vastly increasing the paperwork applicants must file to qualify for the program in order to avoid making mistakes that could result in the loss of federal funding.
According to the Times, this has created "bureaucratic chaos" that has caused many otherwise eligible people to lose aid.
"It can take months to reach besieged caseworkers, and offices have gone as far as asking people with panhandling income for verification from strangers dropping cash in their jar," reported the Times. "Arizonans losing SNAP say they are skipping meals, quarreling over food, and missing rent payments to restock pantry shelves."
One former SNAP beneficiary featured in the Times story was Dee McDonald, a 65-year-old cancer survivor who reported skipping meals to ensure that the three grandsons she's raising have enough to eat.
According to the Times, McDonald has been scrambling from one local food pantry to another to ensure there is enough food in the house for the whole family, a process she told the paper has left her "exhausted."
“I go to sleep thinking about what are we going to have,” McDonald said.
Michael Wisehart, director of the Arizona Department of Economic Security, told the Times that it's "frankly sickening to me the number of individuals" who are suffering due to the bureaucratic hurdles the state is enacting.
However, Wisehart said that if Arizona doesn't add these bureaucratic layers, it could risk seeing its SNAP program completely destroyed.
“It’s an existential threat,” he explained. “States are absolutely contemplating a world in which SNAP isn’t available."
Another state facing this dilemma is Arkansas, which the local news station KATV reported on Monday is scrambling to lower its SNAP error rate that, under new rules, could cost the state $55 million per year.
Keesa Smith-Brantley, executive director of Arkansas Advocates for Children and Families and former deputy director of the Arkansas Department of Human Services, told KATV that the financial penalties imposed on the state could create a downward spiral in which state officials have fewer resources to effectively lower the SNAP error rate.
"It is very concerning that we may not have a SNAP program in years to come if the state can't come up with the funding," said Smith-Brantley.
A Tuesday report in Axios examined how the GOP's SNAP cuts have impacted Virginia, where 100,000 fewer residents are now enrolled in the program compared to a year ago.
Aaron McClung, chief development officer at Feed More, an umbrella organization for food banks in the central part of the state, told Axios that visits to food pantries have increased by more than 20% since the passage of the GOP budget law last year.
While food banks have tried to fill the gap, McClung said, they are no substitute for SNAP, which he described as "the nation's most effective, dignified, and scalable tool for reducing food insecurity."
Jacqueline Mott, Virginia state manager for the Save the Children Action Network, expressed a similar sentiment, telling Axios that "charitable food assistance was never designed to replace SNAP."
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