President Donald Trump’s administration is demanding that states “stand back” completely Benefits of Snap The payments were made under court orders in recent days, now that the U.S. Supreme Court has stayed those rulings, marking the latest swing in a seesaw legal battle over an anti-hunger program used by 42 million Americans.
The USDA’s request came as more than two dozen states warned of “catastrophic operational disruptions” if the Trump administration did not reimburse them for SNAP benefits they authorized before the Supreme Court’s stay.
Nonprofits and Democratic attorneys general sued to force the Trump administration to maintain the program in November despite sanctions Ongoing government shutdown. They received favorable rulings last week, resulting in… Rapid release of benefits For millions in several states. The Trump administration has indicated to states that it will facilitate full payments in accordance with the provisions, while also resuming them.
Friday night, Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson Temporarily paused Rulings order disbursement of the full SNAP amount while an appeals court considers the administration’s request to halt payments. That prompted the Agriculture Department on Saturday to write state SNAP administrators to warn them that it now considers full payments under advance orders “unauthorized.”
“To the extent that states sent complete SNAP payment files for November 2025, this was unauthorized,” Patrick Penn, deputy undersecretary of the Department of Agriculture, wrote to state SNAP administrators. “Accordingly, states should immediately reverse any steps taken to issue full SNAP benefits for November 2025.”
Penn warned that countries could face sanctions if they did not comply. It was not clear whether the guidance applied to states that used their own money to keep the program alive or to states that relied entirely on federal funds. The Ministry of Agriculture did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In a federal court filing on Sunday, the agency said states moved too quickly and wrongly issued full SNAP benefits after last week’s rulings.
Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska on Sunday called the guidance “shocking” if it applied to states, like hers, that used their own money to support the program.
“It’s one thing if the federal government is going to pursue the appellate level through the courts to say, ‘No, this can’t be done,'” Murkowski said. “But when you tell the states that have said this is an important enough issue in our state that we will find resources or backfill or front-load, whatever you want to term it, to help our people, those states should not be penalized.”
Democratic Gov. Maura Healey of Massachusetts said SNAP benefits were processed and placed on EFT cards before the U.S. Supreme Court’s order Friday night, in line with previous guidance from the USDA. She said that if Trump tries to recover the money, we will see him in court.
“Massachusetts residents who have money on their cards should continue to spend it on food,” she said in a statement Sunday. “President Trump should focus on reopening the government he controls rather than repeatedly fighting to keep food from American families.”
Democrats have He criticized Trump for targeting the anti-hunger program During the government shutdown, the administration was able to maintain this even with other parts of the government idle. As senators worked over the weekend to reach an agreement to end the stalemate, the bipartisan package of measures agreed upon to keep some aspects of the government open included full funding for SNAP programs and a provision ensuring reimbursement for expenses made during the shutdown.
More than two dozen states represented by Democratic attorneys general and other party officeholders warned Saturday in a lawsuit that even before the Supreme Court suspended the rulings, the Trump administration was refusing to reimburse them for legally required SNAP payments.
Wisconsin, for example, loaded benefits onto cards for 700,000 residents once a Rhode Island judge ordered the benefits restored last week, but after the U.S. Treasury froze its reimbursements to the state, it expects to run out of money by Monday, Democratic Gov. Tony Evers’ administration warned in a lengthy statement Sunday.
States have warned that the lack of funds could leave vendors unpaid and lead to mounting legal claims. “States may face claims to return hundreds of millions of dollars in total,” the US filing to the First Circuit Court of Appeals said.
The file concludes that this situation “would risk catastrophic operational disruptions to the states, with a consequent cascade of harm to their populations.”
Evers issued a quick response to the Trump administration’s request to reverse the payments. “No,” the governor said in a statement.
“Pursuant to and consistent with an active court order, the State of Wisconsin lawfully loaded benefits onto the cards, ensuring that nearly 700,000 Wisconsin residents, including nearly 270,000 children, have access to essential food and groceries,” Evers said. “After we did so, the Trump administration assured Wisconsin and other states that they were actively working to implement full SNAP benefits for November and would ‘complete the necessary processes to make the funds available.’ They have failed to do so thus far.”
“In the last six days, we have received four different directive actions” from the Trump administration, Maryland Gov. Wes Moore said in a CBS interview on Sunday. He was angered by the latest, which threatened to punish states that paid the full benefits.
“There is chaos, and it is intentional chaos, that we are seeing from this administration,” Moore said.
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Riccardi reported from Denver and Bauer from Madison, Wisconsin. John Hanna in Topeka, Kansas, and Lisa Mascaro in Washington, D.C., contributed to this report.