Donald Trump's SNAP Benefit Cut Plans Suffer Blow
A plan by Republicans to shift a portion of federal food stamp costs to state governments suffered a major setback after the Senate parliamentarian found it would violate chamber rules.
The blocked provision was an attempt to reduce federal spending on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), affecting more than 40 million low-income Americans who rely on food aid. The shift would have transferred major SNAP costs to the states, requiring them to pay at least 5 percent—and potentially more—of benefit costs, which analysts warned could result in significant cuts to nutrition support.
The parliamentarian's decision places additional pressure on the bill's champions to find alternative means to fund tax cuts without imperiling food assistance, Medicaid, or other federal support programs.
The provision, a cornerstone of Republican efforts to offset the costs of President Donald Trump's multitrillion-dollar tax and spending legislation, has been ruled inadmissible under Senate rules, sending GOP leaders scrambling to revise the mega bill.
The ruling, issued by Senate parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough, came as the package prepared for a vote. While her opinions are advisory, they are rarely ignored in lawmaking practice. Republican lawmakers are now searching for new savings as they continue to advance Trump's legislative priorities despite the setback.
MacDonough declared the SNAP cost-sharing plan noncompliant with the chamber's budget reconciliation rules, specifically the Byrd Rule, which bars certain policy measures from being attached to budget bills. The proposal would have shifted billions of dollars in SNAP costs from the federal government to the states, creating a new fiscal obligation for state governments and threatening coverage for millions.
House Passes Bill with GOP SNAP Cuts
The House passed the broader tax and spending package along party lines in May 2025, including a provision to require states to fund at least 5 percent of SNAP benefits and more for high error rates. The House-passed measure's SNAP provision was projected to save about $128 billion. Republican leaders had hoped these savings would help offset the bill's $4.5 trillion in tax cuts and new spending.
Other Key Provisions
Beyond SNAP, the package includes an extension and expansion of individual and business tax cuts, new work requirements for Medicaid recipients, cuts to federal health and nutrition programs, increased military and border security funding, and the elimination of taxes on tips for service workers.
GOP Paths Forward
Republican leaders, including Senate Agriculture Committee Chair John Boozman of Arkansas, said they were exploring options to keep the legislation on track while still delivering savings elsewhere. Options range from modifying the disputed SNAP provision to removing it entirely or risking a procedural vote requiring 60 votes—an unlikely scenario in the current Senate.
Impact on SNAP Recipients
The plan would have expanded work requirements to older adults (up to age 65), a component that remains in the bill for now. Democrats and anti-hunger advocates warned of significant harm to those in need, with more than 3 million individuals projected to lose food stamp access based on Congressional Budget Office estimates.
Additional Rulings Expected
The Senate parliamentarian is also expected to rule on other elements in the bill, including limits on immigrant eligibility for nutrition aid and changes to federal agencies, with further decisions likely to shape the final legislation.
Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar, the top Democrat on the Senate Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry Committee, said: "We will keep fighting to protect families in need," opposing shifts in SNAP costs to states, which she said would result in significant benefit cuts.
Arkansas Senator John Boozman, chair of the Senate Agriculture Committee, said Republicans are "exploring options" to comply with Senate rules, while supporting those reliant on SNAP.
Senate Republicans are expected to revise the bill to comply with the parliamentarian's rulings or drop the contested SNAP provisions. Further decisions from the adviser on other elements of the megabill are anticipated before any final Senate vote.
This article contains reporting from The Associated Press.
Related Articles
When Are July 2025 SNAP Payments Coming?Republicans Out Of Step With Voters On Medicaid FundingNew York State Facing Lawsuit Over SNAP BenefitsSNAP Recipients Get Extra Money This Month in California
2025 NEWSWEEK DIGITAL LLC.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Bloomberg
12 minutes ago
- Bloomberg
Four Scenarios Facing a Trump-Rattled World Economy
With his decision to bomb Iranian nuclear facilities and join Israel's war on Iran, President Donald Trump has injected new geopolitical risks into an already fragile global economy. It also makes what comes next in his trade and economic conflicts all the more important. It should be causing some recalculations. And perhaps deleting a popular meme.
USA Today
16 minutes ago
- USA Today
Do you think the Supreme Court is partisan? Well you're wrong.
Earlier this month, the Supreme Court ruled on a religious liberty case, a firearms case and a DEI case, and most Americans probably didn't hear about any of them. Why? Every decision was unanimous. Recent polling has shown that Americans continue to view the Supreme Court as extremely partisan. Just 20% of those polled view the nation's highest courtas politically neutral, and its favorability is far higher among Republicans than Democrats. These opinions on SCOTUS come from a lack of nuance in conversations around the court, in which Republicans are furious when one of their preferred justices occasionally disagrees with President Donald Trump, and where Democrats ignore the Supreme Court cases that don't get decided along political ideology. The ideological lines on the court shouldn't be chalked up to the party of the president who appointed each justice, and the media narrative suggesting such should be dispelled. Can we finally leave Justice Amy Coney Barrett alone? There is no better example of the lack of nuanced conversation surrounding the Supreme Court than Justice Amy Coney Barrett. She has been villainized by the left for being a Trump sycophant and has been smeared as a liberal in disguise by some of Trump's most ardent supporters. In recent months, Barrett has been under fire from MAGA for not being sufficiently committed to their cause. Glossing over the fact that the job of judges is to determine what the law is, rather than what it ought to be, these individuals have gone from praising Barrett's integrity at her confirmation to demanding she sacrifice it for Trump's causes. Opinion: Liberals owe Justice Barrett an apology. She's clearly not in Trump's pocket. What has Barrett done to deserve any of this? Well, she had the audacity to rule against Trump on a couple of occasions. That's it. Justice Barrett joined the liberal justices in dissent against the majority decision to allow Trump to use the Alien Enemies Act for deportations, as well as voting against the Trump administration's attempts to freeze funds from the U.S. Agency for International Development. Since arriving on the court in 2020, Barrett has joined majorities to overturn Roe v. Wade, restore the right to carry a handgun, eliminate racist affirmative action practices, rein in executive bureaucracy and even expand presidential immunity. No reasonable person could argue that her jurisprudence in these cases is advancing any liberal causes, but the fact that she has ruled against Trump on occasion somehow overrides all of that evidence. Both parties have a warped view of who Justice Barrett is, and that is a symptom of a much larger problem about Americans' information about the court. The news media has played a role in that overall view. News media needs to do a better job of covering SCOTUS Earlier this month, the Supreme Court ruled on a religious liberty case, a firearms case and a discrimination case, and most Americans probably didn't hear about any of them. Opinion: There is no 'reverse discrimination,' people. There is only discrimination. The reason for that is the fact that every one of these decisions was unanimous, each written by one of the three liberal justices, so they didn't fit the narrative of the extremely polarized Supreme Court that Americans have been barraged with in recent years. Naturally, the court tends to split on the highest profile cases, which intuitively makes sense. After all, they are divisive. However, the vast majority of cases undermine the partisan tale often told of the court. For the 2022-23 term, the last for which data has been published, conservative justices only agreed with each other on roughly half of their cases, and in some cases, even they were more likely to agree with a certain liberal justice. Some experts have categorized the justices according to their regard for the consequences of the rulings, instead of political leanings. Justices Barrett, Brett Kavanaugh and Chief Justice John Roberts seem to be more concerned with consequences outside of the specific case they are ruling on. The result is that, in some respects, this group of three is closer to the liberal justices than their conservative colleagues. Furthermore, each justice has individual tendencies that differentiate them from even their ideological allies. Neil Gorsuch has a libertarian streak of generally standing up to the government and has a soft spot for the rights of Native Americans. The popular partisan narrative for the Supreme Court gives a very narrow view of how the justices' ideologies actually play out in practice. Americans should look to the justices' own personal tendencies and judicial philosophy to characterize them, rather than simply grouping them by party. Dace Potas is an opinion columnist for USA TODAY and a graduate of DePaul University with a degree in political science.
Yahoo
21 minutes ago
- Yahoo
JD Vance Roasted For Line That Inadvertently Seemed To Insult Donald Trump
Vice President JD Vance faced ridicule on Sunday over what critics mockingly suggested was an inadvertent insult of Donald Trump. Appearing on NBC's 'Meet The Press,' Vance was defending U.S. strikes on Iran as he told anchor Kristen Welker that he could 'certainly empathize with Americans who are exhausted after 25 years of foreign entanglements in the Middle East.' 'I understand the concern, but the difference is that back then we had dumb presidents,' Vance said. 'And now we have a president who actually knows how to accomplish America's national security objectives.' Vance: I empathize with Americans who are exhausted after 25 years of foreign entanglements in the Middle East. I understand the concern, but the difference is that back then we had dumb presidents — Acyn (@Acyn) June 22, 2025 The comment raised eyebrows, especially given how Trump was president for four years during the quarter-century period Vance referred to, alongside George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Joe Biden. Vance also promised the current strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities wouldn't turn into 'some long, drawn-out thing,' saying: 'We've got in, we've done the job of setting their nuclear program back.' But moments later, he appeared to contradict that assurance by adding: 'We're going to now work to permanently dismantle that nuclear program over the coming years, and that is what the president has set out to do.' This is insane behavior from a vice president. This administration has lost all amount of decency. — bleezy 🔮 (@bleezy_eth) June 22, 2025 🚨 BREAKING: Trump was president for four years during that time Vance is talking about. — SatoshEh (@SatoshEh) June 22, 2025 Dumb presidents? The current president thinks windmills cause cancer and can't spell parade correctly but go off couch boi — Colin Gubbins (@RitleySammich) June 22, 2025 Absolute piece of shit. — Kristen Schaal (@kristenschaaled) June 23, 2025 Does he really think his audience is this 'dumb'!? — Lib Dunk (@libdunkmedia) June 22, 2025 Donald was one of them. Now he is again. — Art Candee 🍿🥤 (@ArtCandee) June 22, 2025 It has become completely normal for Trump and Vance to refer to their predecessors as stupid and dumb. Doing it once would have been scandalously uncouth in any other administration. Yet another subtle sign of America's decline. — William Alfred Pawson (@wilfredpawson) June 22, 2025 Vance: It's not gonna be some long drawn out thingVance 5 seconds later: And we're going to continue dismantling it over the coming years — Akoshic Revival (@AkoshicMutiny) June 22, 2025 Dumb presidents? Really. Crude and ignorant language coming from one of the country's "leaders." He'll probably be praised by Fox News and right-wing social media. — Holy Bullies (@holybullies) June 22, 2025 He's saying Trump is a smart president?Is he serious? 🧐 — Ryca (@_oRyca_) June 22, 2025 If we're calling 'then' presidents dumb, what are we calling this one? — Karly Kingsley (@karlykingsley) June 22, 2025 Trump not being the dumbest president isn't gonna fly. — Outspoken™️ (@Out5p0ken) June 22, 2025 Huh? We have the dumbest motherfucker on the planet as our current president. — Fookin Chookay 🎗️🇺🇸🦅🇳🇴🇮🇪🏳️🌈🌊🇺🇦🇮🇱 (@slayergoddess69) June 22, 2025 As opposed to the guy who hosted a reality game show and thinks BleachBit is a bathroom cleaner? — Warren (@swd2) June 22, 2025 Kayleigh McEnany's 'Every Dictator' Take On Trump Iran Strike Draws Online Fire Critics Point Out Glaring Contradiction In Trump's Iran 'Regime Change' Post Trump Rages At Reporter Who Refuses To Stick To 'Positive' Questions
