Food insecurity in America has long been a prominent issue—especially since the COVID-19 pandemic, a moment when those facing hunger became all the more visible as unemployment rates surged and households faced economic hardship.
In 2023, an estimated 13.5% of households, or 1 in 7, were food insecure, up from 10.5% in 2020, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). And with grocery store prices increasing, buying food, especially healthy food, is a major concern, one that skewed voters in the 2024 election.
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On the campaign trail, President Donald Trump vowed to quell voter concerns about grocery prices, putting affordability at the center of his platform. “A vote for Trump means your groceries will be cheaper,” he remarked during one campaign stop. Trump visited a grocery store in Pennsylvania in September, where he commented on the high prices and paid for the groceries of some customers.
But some who utilize government welfare programs in order to obtain food are concerned that Trump’s promises will clash with his determination to cut government spending. Since Trump returned to the Oval Office, his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) team, headed by Tesla CEO Elon Musk, has cut thousands of federal jobs and closed offices across multiple agencies. The Trump Administration is also attempting to dismantle the Department of Education.
Experts on food insecurity have been worried about what some of these cuts might mean for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), America’s largest nutrition assistance program—speficially as the USDA has slashed programs that reportedly provided more than $1 billion for schools and food banks to purchase food from local farms and ranchers. USDA is also reported to have halted millions of dollars worth of deliveries to food banks nationwide.
TIME has reached out to USDA for comment.
Alongside concern over the extent SNAP may be impacted by DOGE cuts, it was revealed on March 28, that new changes will be coming from the newly-installed Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who has professed strong stances against processed foods and the influence large corporations can have on food production in the U.S.
Here’s what you need to know about SNAP and the challenges it faces under the Trump Administration.
What is SNAP?
The SNAP program is a food assistance program, and one of the larger social welfare programs in the country.
Jilly Stephens, CEO of City Harvest, a food rescue organization that’s been operating in New York City for over 40 years, says that SNAP is a “critical program.”
“We’ll work very hard to do everything we can, but the scale of the SNAP program is enormous. It reaches so many tens of millions of Americans, that’s not a hole that could be filled by private charity,” she says.
The program helps more than 42 million people. The amount provided to eligible households depends on income and family size. Generally, eligible families must have a gross monthly income at or below 130% of the federal poverty guidelines.
The SNAP benefits are provided through a card—similar to a debit card—that users can deploy at certain grocery stores and other authorized food retailers. According to the USDA, the benefits can be spent on food including breads, cereals, fruits, vegetables, meats, fish and poultry. It does not include tobacco, alcohol, preprepared meals, or non-food items.
At the federal level, SNAP is administered by the USDA’s Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) and the maximum amount of SNAP benefits is based on what’s called the Thrifty Food Plan, an estimate by the USDA of how much it costs to buy groceries needed to provide a “nutritious, practical, cost-effective diet” for a family of two adults and two children.
Craig Gundersen, an economist at Baylor University, says there are four reasons why he teaches that SNAP is a “quintessential successful government program.”
The first, he says, is that the program is “well-directed” to those who have a lower income, and thus most in need to receive benefits. According to a report by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) using USDA data, more than 62% of SNAP participants are in families with children and more than 37% are in families with members who are older adults or are disabled. The second reason Gundersen flags is that SNAP is an entitlement program—meaning it’s based on laws that establish eligibility requirements, and qualifying recipients are legally owed these benefits. Third, it is “readily accepted” by many food stores in America—over 250,000 retailers nationwide.
Gundersen says the fourth reason is the most important: autonomy.
“We have a lot of government programs which, from my perspective, are often belittling and insulting [to those who use them]. SNAP is not like that,” he says. “It gives people the dignity to shop at the same food stores as their family and friends, and also gives them the autonomy to make their own choices.”
SNAP also significantly decreases the likelihood of food insecurity by roughly 30% and the likelihood of being very food insecure by 20%, according to the USDA.
What is happening to SNAP under the Trump Administration?
Several changes to the SNAP program have been widely reported since Trump’s return to the White House.
The new budget plan passed by House Republicans on March 11 contained instructions to cut as much as $230 billion across USDA programs. Part of this would be through a shift in cost share, employing state budgets to aid in covering SNAP—a program for which benefit costs have historically been covered by the federal government.
Though it is not confirmed exactly how these cuts will be distributed across the USDA, some experts and lawmakers say it is unlikely not to cause an impact.
“It is impossible to do those kinds of cuts without cutting staff funding that would put about 42 million Americans at risk for food insecurity,” says Rep. April McClain Delany, a Democrat from Maryland. “And I am a farmer’s daughter. I’m a potato farmer’s daughter from Idaho who now lives in Maryland, but I understand a little bit about agriculture.”
Delany points out that SNAP cuts would likely ripple across multiple industries, citing data also emphasized by fellow Democrat and House Committee Ranking Member Angie Craig, that credits SNAP with creating 45,000 new jobs in supporting industries in 2020 and nearly 200,000 grocery industry jobs. Cuts to SNAP wouldn’t just impact recipients, but also grocery stores who utilize the program, and the farmers who produce the food.
Salaam Bhatti, director of the SNAP unit at the Food Research and Action Center, seconds Delany’s concerns, pointing out that over 90% of the SNAP budget goes to benefits to purchase food.
He also says that there’s an economic benefit to investing in SNAP. A study done by USDA in 2019 found that during economic downturns, every dollar spent on new SNAP benefits increases the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) by $1.54.
“So while a lot of people may know about SNAP being something that helps people put food on the table. It actually benefits the entire economy,” Bhatti says. “We see the staff dollars help to keep the lights on at your grocery stores and keep the staff employed. It helps the truck driver transport the food, and ultimately, it helps pay the farmer for the food that they grow.”
According to the CBPP, “requiring states to pay even a modest portion of SNAP benefits” would “undermine SNAP’s critical role as an economic stimulus.”
Stephens of City Harvest says that her organization’s advocacy team, along with other Feeding America groups, are speaking with Congresspeople to “underscore that these cuts to SNAP should not go through, and that teams will be in D.C. as often as they need to be.”
What role does Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the Health and Human Services Secretary, play in this?
Though Kennedy is not in charge of SNAP, as HHS secretary, he is in a position to directly influence policies around food regulation, nutrition standards, and federal dietary guidelines, especially at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), a federal agency of the HHS.
On March 28, Kennedy announced that as a part of his “Make America Healthy Again” initiative, the Trump Administration will allow states—beginning with West Virginia, led by Gov. Patrick Morrisey—to bar recipients of SNAP and other federal food assistance programs from using the money received to pay soft drinks.
This comes after Kennedy spoke about SNAP during his confirmation hearing with the Senate Finance Committee in January.
“Federal funding of the SNAP program for example and of school lunch programs could be a driver for helping kids,” he said. “We shouldn’t be giving 60% of the kids in school processed food that is making them sick. We shouldn’t be spending 10% of the SNAP program on sugar drinks, so we have a direct ability to change things there.”
Removing certain foods from SNAP, as much as Kennedy may want to do so, is potentially problematic. Experts worry that Kennedy’s words add stigma to an already stigmatized process, and that it may take away the “dignity and autonomy” associated with the program.
According to the USDA, receiving SNAP “does not increase the likelihood of being overweight or obese.” Hanna Garth, assistant professor of anthropology at Princeton, has spent time researching household food access and basic needs, with a specific focus on households in South Los Angeles. Garth says that most people she meets while doing this line of research use food stamps to buy fresh fruit and vegetables on deals.
“The stereotype that people who are on SNAP are just eating junk food, or that people who are on SNAP are somehow undeserving, is completely wrong,” Garth says. “The people mostly have jobs. They’re hard working. They’re contributing to our society in a lot of really important ways, but they don’t make enough money.”