Govt. Shutdown Hits Milestone With No End in Sight — Food Aid Next To Be Impacted
We’re in the 23rd day of the federal government shutdown — making it the second-longest shutdown in U.S. history. With no end in sight, it’s quickly approaching the longest, which lasted 35 days back in 2018-2019.
While the standoff is about health care this round, the impacts of the shutdown are starting to be felt beyond the D.C. area, where work for hundreds of thousands of federal employees has been suspended and pay paused.
SNAP BENEFITS
In just over a week, 25 states plan to pause the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) — the nation’s largest anti-hunger initiative — and the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC) starting Nov. 1. The programs help nearly 50 million people combined.
Recipients, on average, receive $187 per month (roughly $6 per day) on prepaid cards they can use to buy groceries.
“The state funding can’t begin to match what the federal government provides,” Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey (D) said Wednesday. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said there is nothing the administration can do “without the government being open.”
Food banks nationwide are bracing for a surge in need just before Thanksgiving, while pantries are already strained by record demand.
ALSO HITTING SOON
Open enrollment for Affordable Care Act (ACA) plans begin in November. With the pandemic-era enhanced subsidies set to expire — benefits which are at the heart of Democrats’ demands — millions of Americans could see their bills double.
If the subsidies are not extended, the 24 million people using the marketplace will pay about $1,904 in annual premiums in 2026, up from $888 this year, according to the nonpartisan health policy group KFF.
HOW THIS ENDS?
As the shutdown drags on — with Republicans and Democrats locked in a stalemate over extending ACA subsidies — some lawmakers are moving to protect critical workers from missing paychecks, including air traffic controllers and TSA staff.
Sen. Ted Cruz (R–Tex.) introduced a bill this week to guarantee pay for air traffic controllers during the shutdown, who are set to miss their first full paycheck Tuesday. Back in 2019, airport staffing shortages ultimately forced Washington to end a similar standoff.
Earlier today, Senate Democrats blocked a separate GOP measure that would have paid some federal employees working without compensation, arguing it would give President Trump too much power to decide which workers get paid while the government remains closed — and which did not.
“[Trump] is not going to negotiate with the Democrats, who have taken the American people hostage. We’re not going to pay a ransom to reopen the government,” House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) said Tuesday.
Unless something changes — or air travel grinds to a halt like in 2019 when unpaid air traffic controllers stopped showing up to work — the U.S. could soon see this shutdown become the longest in history.