New York sues over SNAP cutoff

ALBANY, N.Y. (NEXSTAR) — The federal government faces two new lawsuits in New York for suspending Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits. An alliance of states including New York sued over SNAP on Tuesday, following the Legal Aid Society’s and the Urban Justice Center’s class-action lawsuit on Monday.

Both lawsuits are available to read at the bottom of this story.

Attorney General Letitia James joined 25 other state and district leaders who filed against the Department of Agriculture and USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins. They argued that pausing monthly food aid breaks federal law.

The other suit challenges the early reinstatement of certain work requirements for about 100,000 New York City residents. They also sued Rollins, claiming her agency illegally ended a waiver from those requirements for able-bodied adults without dependents in New York City.

“No state can backfill this essential federal program,” said Governor Kathy Hochul in a Monday statement that backed the multistate lawsuit. “We are staring down a public health crisis that puts one million children and over 600,000 older adults lives at risk because Republicans in Washington are refusing to do their jobs and the Trump Administration is hellbent on letting Americans suffer the consequences.”

The federal position on funding

The federal government has said it won’t issue SNAP because of the government shutdown. Under President Donald Trump, the USDA told states to hold November issuance files and delay transmission to EBT vendors on October 10. USDA claimed that contingency funds are only supposed to supplement regular monthly benefits if not enough money was appropriated and concluded that the money can’t cover SNAP “because the appropriation for regular benefits no longer exists.”

On October 24, the agency told states to suspend all November 2025 payouts. They argued that contingency funds are specifically for “contingencies” like the Disaster SNAP program. The department said that, once federal funding is available, they “will notify State agencies of when the suspension is lifted to allow for immediate action to resume issuing November and subsequent monthly benefits to eligible households.”

But “Senate Democrats have now voted 12 times to not fund the food stamp program,” the according to the banner on USDA’s website. “Bottom line, the well has run dry. At this time, there will be no benefits issued November 1.”

The states’ lawsuit and counterarguments

Meanwhile, the multistate coalition insists that suspending benefits on November 1 is both avoidable and unnecessary. Their lawsuit requests a restraining order that would force the USDA to use existing contingency funds to keep food aid flowing.

According to the filing, New York has over 2.9 million people on SNAP, including over 920,000 children and over 600,000 older adults. Altogether, New Yorkers got about $650 million in SNAP per month over the past year. About 7% of recipients here had a disability, and about 17,000 merchants in New York accept SNAP.

James and the other states argued that USDA has at least $6 billion specifically appropriated by Congress for SNAP in case of a federal shutdown. The Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2024 earmarked $3 billion that “shall be placed in reserve for use only in such amounts and at such times as may become necessary to carry out program operations” through September 30, 2026. And a 2025 continuing resolution funded $3 billion more contingency reserves through that same date.

In September 2025, the USDA even acknowledged that SNAP had years of contingency funds for “participant benefits in the event that a lapse occurs in the middle of the fiscal year,” and that the agency has funded SNAP during past government shutdowns.

Besides the dedicated $6 billion SNAP contingency reserves, the attorneys general in the coalition further contended that the USDA could transfer other available funds to cover the benefits. In October, the agency used Section 32 funds to cover WIC, the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children.

But the October 24 memo said USDA won’t use it’s over $23 billion in Section 32 funds for SNAP. They claimed doing so would jeopardize funding for school meals and infant formula, though they didn’t offer figures to substantiate that position. The multistate lawsuit called out the USDA for arbitrarily not funding SNAP this way.

NYC work requirement lawsuit

The lawsuit from the Legal Aid Society and the Urban Justice Center posed a separate challenge. It said the USDA prematurely terminated a waiver from work requirements for ABAWDs, which had previously applied to almost every county, including the Five Boroughs.

The waiver was granted because of a “lack of sufficient jobs” in 61 out of New York’s 62 counties, initially approved to through February 28, 2026. In New York City, the average unemployment rates ranged from 4.2% to 7.2%—double the national average—for the period of the cancelled waiver.

But the USDA announced on October 3 that current ABAWD waivers would end on November 2. The lawsuit calls this unlawful because the One Big Beautiful Bill Act of 2025 doesn’t let the USDA terminate waivers before their expiration dates. But OBBBA tightened the criteria for future waivers, requiring an over 10% unemployment rate in a given area.

Announcing the waiver termination, USDA told states to prepare by updating eligibility systems, notifying households of the time limit, and training new workers. The department claimed that ABAWDs “have ample opportunities to re-engage with their communities” through work that meets new federal requirements.

That early termination gives about 100,000 New York City SNAP recipients classified as ABAWDs one month to get a new exemption, find a job, or enroll in approved work programs. They have to document 80 hours of qualifying work-related activity per month.

“Countable months” of noncompliance start in December for those who don’t comply. Recipients who accrue three countable months then lose SNAP benefits, with the first losses as early as March 1.

The new, compressed 30-day timeline will cause administrative chaos and errors, according to the lawsuit, because local agencies will have to send about 100,000 letters about the issue in 15 languages. And the lawsuit argued that recipients can’t find work that accommodates their needs on such short notice. Plus, the NYC Human Resources Administration would have to hire new staff to process thousands of appointments per day throughout November to screen for exemptions, on top of over 50,000 appointments already scheduled.

The Cornell University warning

Interrupting SNAP also disrupts food retail systems, small grocers, and regional economies that depend on the spending. Retailers already purchased bigger inventories to supply Thanksgiving demand that won’t materialize. On Tuesday, experts from Cornell University cautioned that less purchasing power will strain the charitable food sector, increase food waste, and lose income for vendors during an economically anemic holiday season.

The National Grocers’ Association reported that SNAP spending drives billions in economic output across grocery stores and other industries, supporting thousands of jobs. Nationwide, the average SNAP benefit was about $187 per person per month in fiscal year 2024.

For families, the loss translates into a less healthy diet, according to Professor Angela Odoms-Young of Cornell. Plus, the murkiness around how long that shutdown could last will make it harder for states to plan and communicate.

And beyond food security, abruptly halting SNAP could pose a risk to democracy, according to Cornell government associate professor Jamila Michener. When the poor lose public benefits, especially if it’s perceived as unfair, they develop the understanding that “their government cannot be relied upon and does not prioritize their needs.” Michener warned against politically demoralizing a low-income citizen “who shows up to vote, who feels like they matter in American democracy, and ultimately, who has power in our political system.”

Here’s the lawsuit from the multistate coalition including Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawai’i, Illinois, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington, and Wisconsin, and the District of Columbia:

And here’s the lawsuit from the Legal Aid Society and the Urban Justice Center: