With Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program funding set to be suspended next month, Delaware is one of dozens of states suing the federal government to restore payments.
Delaware Attorney General Kathy Jennings joins 22 other state attorneys general and three governors suing the US Department of Agriculture to keep SNAP funding flowing during the government shutdown.
The states filing the suit say USDA has access to contingency funds which can be used to fund the program, calling the decision not to access that money “deliberate, illegal and inhumane.” In Delaware, some 119,000 people receive SNAP benefits, about one in nine residents.
The lawsuit contends that the Department of Agriculture has as much as $6 billion in reserve funds appropriated by Congress in 2024 and 2025 specifically for times when funding for SNAP is not available. It also alleges that, despite the use of the reserve funds being part of a USDA shutdown plan detailed on October 1, the department backtracked on that assertion later in the month.
A hearing on the suit is scheduled for tomorrow (Thursday) in Massachusetts. The judge in that hearing is a 2013 Obama appointee.
