The longest-ever federal government shutdown came to an end, as eight senators in the Democratic caucus caved to pressure and broke with the party to make a deal with the GOP to enact a temporary funding bill in exchange for weak or empty promises. I have some pretty, shall we say, colorful opinions on this decision, which came immediately after Democrats significantly outperformed expectations in last week’s elections and as Trump himself was acknowledging that his party was losing politically on the shutdown.
I’ll save those for some other time, though, as instead we’re focusing on one of the programs that had been most acutely threatened by the shutdown, SNAP benefits. For a period there, it looked like all funding would be terminated, though to be clear, prior shutdowns had not affected food stamps, as the federal government has access to emergency funds to keep the crucial program going. Yet the Trump administration had been fighting tooth and nail in court for the ability to suspend the aid, recently receiving the temporary blessing of the Supreme Court to avoid paying out. That issue has been put to rest by the end of the shutdown, as funds begin flowing again, though that certainly doesn’t mean we’re out of the woods on the issue.
All of this recent activity meant that we haven’t been talking about the administration’s other plans for SNAP, beyond the shutdown. As New York Focus delineated in a good story this week, aside from the shutdown cliff, the administration is plowing ahead with requirements that were contained in this summer’s so-called “big beautiful bill,” but sooner than originally planned. The bill significantly expands the pool of people who can only receive SNAP benefits if they can prove they are working or engaged in an educational activity or training program or volunteering, for a minimum of 80 hours per month. The new rules imposed by the bill also restrict eligibility for many noncitizens who are legally present in the country and will increase the costs for states to administer the program, as well as remove waivers that had provided some flexibility. Broadly speaking, the upshot will almost certainly be to kick millions of people out of the program – in what looks like the Republicans’ actual intent.
As public policy experts noted in advance of the bill’s passage, these changes will affect a much broader pool of people than simply those whose eligibility is being directly withdrawn, given the added costs to run the program — which is federally funded but operated by states — and the added logistical hurdles for recipients to prove compliance. The requirements for establishing eligibility are designed to be onerous enough that people either give up or are tripped up and pushed out of the program in ways that can be difficult to reverse. These rules were expected to take effect next summer. Instead, the administration decided last month that they will go into effect this month. The change has state officials scrambling to adjust, and is also expected to impose significant costs on New York and its counties, since they will have to develop systems to track much more granular details on its SNAP recipients to continue receiving federal funds.
These impending changes are coming not only to food assistance, but to medical insurance, setting up a double whammy for what could be a million or more New Yorkers losing both Medicaid and SNAP in short order, tossing them into a storm of precarity that the state would have to find ways to address on its own (the Medicaid changes are coming on a longer timeline than the impending SNAP ones, expected to phase in over the next year).
As I often have tried to illustrate, these types of changes to benefits, grants, and entitlements have repercussions that are compounding and systemic, extending well beyond those directly impacted. Billions of dollars in federal funds that disappear from hospital balance sheets means that those institutions might have to close. Add to that the impending end of the Obamacare subsidies that triggered the shutdown in the first place — and if you believe that, now that they’ve gotten their funding bill, MAGA Republicans will hold a vote on a standalone bill to preserve ACA insurance subsidies, I’ve got a bridge to sell you — and we’re looking at hundreds of thousands of people in this state alone going newly uninsured.
Especially if you live in a part of the state that doesn’t have as many options as New York City, it doesn’t really matter what kind of insurance you personally have if you can’t find specialists in your area. When people go uninsured either because they are documented immigrants rendered ineligible, trip up new requirements, or simply can’t afford unsubsidized premiums, it certainly doesn’t mean that we won’t be paying for their health care anyway. It simply means that we will be paying more for their emergency room visits while they suffer from worse health outcomes.
As described by New York Focus, the plan across the state right now seems to be, well, panic. There’s not really a concrete playbook for this; while federal entitlements have been a bit of a conservative bugbear forever, most political figures in contemporary U.S. history have understood that too aggressively targeting things like food aid and Medicaid would inevitably have political blowback, given just how widespread usage of these benefits is across the country. There’s simply no congressional district and certainly no state where there aren’t thousands and thousands of people dependent on SNAP and Medicaid. Now, though, it seems like the old political rules are crumbling as President Donald Trump and his entourage seem perfectly okay with the way they’re bleeding public support by targeting popular programs and threatening the economy.
So what does this all mean for New York City? It’s hard to say, though unfortunately I must conclude that the prognosis is dire. It is practically impossible for the state and the city to alone replicate benefits at the sheer scale of the federal government, and our budgets were not hashed out on the assumption $15 billion-plus per year in federal dollars would suddenly evaporate. It’s going to be a particularly unenviable position for Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, who will be taking office at the beginning of next year right as this meteor hits his signature issue of affordability. So far, it seems like social services organizations here and across the state are focusing on getting people into compliance with the new SNAP rules — steering current recipients to job assistance and training programs that can help them fulfill the new requirements and avoid being kicked off, even if it is a paperwork headache. Of course, for noncitizens now ineligible, there is no such option, and they will simply have to make do without.
The impact will be blunted somewhat by the fact that New York has its own slate of social service programs, including the NYC Health + Hospitals public hospital system that can provide free or low-cost services and managed-care programs even to those that are fully uninsured, as well as local and state-level housing assistance like CityFHEPS and so on. Other parts of the state don’t have quite the same infrastructure, though, as I mentioned, even NYC can’t quite do what the feds do. There’s a more limited ability to challenge these things in the same way that other Trump policies have been challenged because, in an unusual move for this administration, these were not a violation of the law. These new standards are themselves the product of a law duly passed by Congress, foreclosing some of the litigation-based avenues that New York could’ve used to push back otherwise.
I’ve heard some renewed talk of the city and state considering a withholding of federal taxes given Trump’s apparent belief that he can direct federal funding as he pleases. While that would have seemed unthinkable a few months ago and certainly carries some heavy legal and logistical concerns, I wouldn’t be surprised if it becomes the subject of more serious conversations in Albany and at City Hall. In the meantime, I think we’re all unfortunately going to have to deal with the rug pull through enhanced local services and mutual aid, where possible.
