Congress

Food-aid cliff bears down on Democrats as shutdown nears 1-month mark

Published

8 months ago

October 23, 2025

Missed paychecks, canceled infrastructure projects and mass firings haven’t yet convinced congressional Democrats to change their government shutdown stance. But they are now facing down another pressure point threatening a program they’ve long championed benefiting millions of Americans.

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which helps feed more than 40 million people, will start to run out of funds Nov. 1, President Donald Trump’s USDA is warning. At least 25 states plan to cut off benefits starting on that date — including California, the overwhelmingly Democratic state with 4.5 million SNAP recipients.

The food-aid cliff has largely flown under the radar as Democrats focus on another Nov. 1 development: the launch of open enrollment for Affordable Care Act insurance plans in most states. They believe massive premium hikes prompted by the expiration of key federal subsidies will compel Republicans to relent and negotiate an extension at that time.

So far, despite the possible food assistance fallout in just over a week, top Democrats are pushing ahead and refusing to shore up the votes to reopen the government.

Asked Tuesday if the cliff would change his party’s calculus, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said it would not: “It should change Republicans’ calculus, that they should sit down and negotiate — negotiate a way to address this crisis.”

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), asked if it was worth pushing the shutdown beyond Nov. 1 given the risk of food aid lapsing, replied, “Worth it to whom? To people who will lose their health care or to people who will lose their food?”

“We’re people who want Americans to have health care and food,” she added. “The Republicans, evidently, don’t care whether they have either.”

Trump and members of his administration have acted selectively to ease shutdown impacts on agencies and programs they perceive as benefiting their political allies — shifting funds to pay active duty troops, for instance, while letting civilian workers go unpaid.

That approach appears to be playing out at USDA, where there is no firm indication the Trump administration will act to patch the impending SNAP lapse. A separate initiative delivering baby formula and other nutrition aid under the Women, Infants and Children program is also at risk next month after the White House moved to use some tariff revenue as a backfill early in the shutdown.

At the same time, the administration is planning to partially reopen key farm loans and shuttered local USDA offices beginning Thursday — addressing a key GOP shutdown pain point that Senate Majority Leader John Thune and other farm state Republican lawmakers have pressed the White House on since the shutdown started four weeks ago.

For now, Trump administration officials and Republican lawmakers are eager to blame Democrats for risking hunger among millions of low-income Americans right before the holiday season.

“The shutdown is Democrat performance art — the audience starves while the elitist critics applaud,” said one White House official who was not authorized to speak publicly.

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) added, “What’s it gonna take … for the Democrats to say, ‘Gee, huh, maybe — maybe people should be able to eat.”

But it’s not just blue states like California and New York that will suffer. Red states are also at high risk, as well as large pockets of rural America that voted for Trump. For instance, Louisiana — home to Speaker Mike Johnson and Majority Leader Steve Scalise — has one of the highest SNAP participation rates in the country, and Scalise noted Wednesday more than 800,000 Louisianans rely on the program.

White House officials are keenly aware of the consequences for their own voters, even as they continue to needle Democrats on the topic. Several Republican governors have already reached out to the administration to understand what the consequences will be.

The Trump administration has options, which officials are weighing, according to three people granted anonymity to discuss the private deliberations: Democrats want USDA to deploy a SNAP contingency fund that currently holds about $5 billion to offset the roughly $9 billion in funding needed to cover costs for November. Sen. Ben Ray Luján, a New Mexico Democrat, is among senators also pushing the administration to use tariff revenue as they’ve done with WIC.

“I would argue that the same authorizations exist for [SNAP] as well,” Luján said.

But some Trump officials say finding a SNAP patch won’t be so simple. Tapping the contingency fund wouldn’t leave money for other emergencies that are known to pop up with the program, and if the full $9 billion can’t be covered, it could take weeks to mete out a smaller percentage of money to each state’s program — meaning families would miss their Nov. 1 food benefits anyway. Meanwhile, the legality of using tariff revenue for SNAP is unclear and would also pull money from child nutrition programs — which the Republican-controlled Congress is unlikely to replenish.

Republicans privately believe the food aid cliff could motivate some more moderate Democratic senators to relent and vote for a GOP-led stopgap bill that would reopen the government. With five additional votes needed to pass that measure, they are eyeing Sens. Jeanne Shaheen and Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire, Kristen Gillibrand of New York and Gary Peters of Michigan, among others.

Peters, who is retiring, said in an interview he has “a lot of concerns” about the possible loss of food aid but that it was up to Republicans to come to the table.

“It’s just so curious that Republicans are not willing to come together on health care — when the ACA tax credits go away, it hits primarily Republican congressional districts and Republican states,” Peters said. “So Republicans don’t care about their own people.”

That rhetoric was echoed by a host of Democrats this week, including California Sen. Alex Padilla, who said “the best way to address that is for Republicans to come to the table, work with Democrats to reopen the government and address the spike in health care costs.”

Others are frustrated that Republicans appear to be using food aid as leverage after moving to cut more than $200 billion in spending from the SNAP program as part of their sweeping domestic policy bill passed this summer along party lines.

“They’re the ones that made the cuts to SNAP to begin with, and they should be funding SNAP,” said Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, the top Democrat on the Senate Agriculture Committee. “So it’s very rich if they’re saying they’re going to cut SNAP when they made all the cuts to begin with.”

Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Texas) estimated 361,000 people in his district — nearly half his constituency — could be affected by the SNAP cliff. But he also noted the high number of families who relied on ACA health insurance subsidies and said he did not see a reason for Democrats to relent right now — pointing to some perceived cracks on the GOP side, such as Thune’s offer to Senate Democrats of a vote to extend the Obamacare tax credits.

Asked how many days Democrats could hold out, Cuellar referenced the record-long shutdown during Trump’s first term. ”Last time,” he said, “we did 35.”

Grace Yarrow contributed to this report.

Congress

Johnson-backed plan to combine Pentagon and election bills advances to floor

Published

3 hours ago

June 30, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

The House Rules Committee advanced a procedural measure aimed at breaking an intra-Republican deadlock Monday night. But GOP leaders are still facing a major battle Tuesday to regain control of the House floor.

The panel approved on party lines a measure to set up Republicans’ $1.1 trillion defense policy bill, a government funding bill and other GOP bills for floor debate. It would then combine the Pentagon bill, once passed, with the contentious elections overhaul known as the SAVE America Act and send it to the Senate as one piece of legislation.

That maneuver, telegraphed by Speaker Mike Johnson earlier Monday, is aimed at appeasing House GOP hard-liners who have blockaded the floor, demanding the Senate pass the elections bill that has languished there for months.

However, Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida, the Republican leading the blockade, said in an interview Monday before the Rules Committee acted that Johnson’s plan is not sufficient — raising the possibility she and allies could vote down the measure on the floor. Other House GOP hard-liners say there are other outstanding issues to battle over Tuesday.

Rep. James McGovern of Massachusetts, the top Rules Democrat, called the merger move “a big waste of time.” The panel voted down a motion by McGovern to remove the provision to combine the two bills in a party-line vote.

The Senate is set to debate its own version of the defense bill next month, and it is likely that the elections overhaul will be removed in negotiations between the two chambers — as McGovern acknowledged Monday and House GOP leaders privately concede.

“The Senate will just strip the SAVE Act out,” he said at the meeting. “There is a zero percent chance SAVE ends up in the [Pentagon bill] because of this rule today.”

The defense bill faces a tight vote if Republicans can pass the procedural measure. Most Democrats are expected to oppose the measure over its massive price tag, which they contend is wasteful.

The panel is set up debate on 312 amendments to the bill. The slate includes GOP measures to codify a Trump executive order to block transgender people from serving in the military, prohibit coverage of gender-affirming care, block aid to arm Ukraine and strip Democratic-backed protections for collective bargaining for Pentagon civilian workers.

The committee also voted down Democratic proposals to slash $150 billion from the bill’s topline and limit the war against Iran.

Mia McCarthy contributed to this report.

Congress

Pentagon and elections bills could be combined in bid to unfreeze House floor

Published

5 hours ago

June 29, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Speaker Mike Johnson said Monday he plans to deploy an unusual procedural maneuver in a bid to unfreeze the House floor this week, seeking to send the annual Pentagon policy bill and the GOP elections bill known as the SAVE America Act to the Senate in a single package.

That is likely a recipe for a continued standoff between the two chambers over the SAVE America Act, which has stalled in the Senate for months due to internal GOP divides. Under Johnson’s plan, the annual defense policy bill, which typically passes every year with large bipartisan majorities, could become a collateral victim of the impasse.

Asked in brief interview if he had talked to Senate Majority Leader John Thune about his plans, Johnson replied, “I have to do my job in the House, and they’ve got to do their job in the Senate, so we’ll see what happens.”

Johnson is seeking to placate House conservative hard-liners, led by Florida Rep. Anna Paulina Luna, who have threatened to oppose the procedural measures that give Republicans control of the floor unless they agree to tougher tactics meant to force the Senate into passing the elections bill.

House GOP leaders discussed the plan to merge the two bills over the weekend as Luna pushed to amend the defense bill directly.

She did not say in an interview Monday whether Johnson’s gambit would suffice: “We want it baked together, not able to be stripped out,” she said.

But the Senate is free to work its own will, and members of that chamber are likely to reject any defense bill that has the partisan elections bill attached. That would set the stage for GOP leaders to strip it out when the House and Senate hash out the differences between their competing Pentagon bills later this year.

Johnson, meanwhile, is pushing a separate plan to pass a slimmed-down version of the SAVE America Act through the party-line budget reconciliation process — an option hard-liners have all but rejected.

“I don’t think that that can be done,” Luna told reporters Monday.

He’s also facing another complication: The version of the SAVE America Act he is proposing to attach to the Pentagon bill doesn’t include the latest demands for the bill from President Donald Trump — including a near-total ban on mail voting that is opposed by many Republicans.

Jennifer Scholtes contributed to this report.

Congress

Top Trump officials face bipartisan questions in first all-member Iran briefings

Published

6 hours ago

June 29, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Lawmakers of both parties questioned Secretary of State Marco Rubio and top Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff Monday in the first broad congressional briefings on President Donald Trump’s Iran deal.

While Democrats asked some of the sharpest questions, participants in an afternoon conference call with House members said, Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) at one point pressed the administration officials on the fate of Iran’s stockpile of near-bomb-grade uranium.

According to two people granted anonymity to disclose the private remarks, Witkoff and Rubio repeated assurances the administration has privately made to select lawmakers in prior briefings — that the goal is to negotiate a final deal that would prohibit Iran from keeping its highly enriched uranium.

The memorandum of understanding Trump signed earlier this month, they said, was meant to launch those negotiations. Witkoff, the people said, added that the technical team involved in that part of the talks was traveling from Switzerland to Qatar, where talks between the U.S. and Iran are set to happen Tuesday.

Democrats, meanwhile, pushed the administration for more details on what financial benefits Iran could reap under the memorandum — including proceeds from previously sanctioned oil sales.

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) went back and forth with Rubio and Witkoff over the lifting of the oil sanctions, two other people granted anonymity on the House call said. The officials eventually cut off the conversation and ended the call.

At another point, Rep. Madeleine Dean (D-Pa.) raised concerns about Witkoff’s business interests in the Middle East as he’s negotiating with Iran, prompting a sharp defense from Rubio, those people said.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer asked Rubio and Witkoff about the oil sanctions during a separate all-senators call Monday, saying in a statement afterward that they “confirmed to me that Iran will reap billions in oil revenue while retaining dangerous leverage over the Strait of Hormuz.”

“If this is the administration’s defense behind closed doors, Secretary Rubio should make it under oath, in public, before the Foreign Relations Committee,” Schumer added, calling the briefing “delayed, deficient, and devoid of details.”

An administration official granted anonymity to speak candidly countered on Schumer’s characterization, noting that he had previously gotten a briefing of the deal as part of a group of top leaders engaged on national security matters. Schumer, the official said, had the opportunity to ask multiple follow-up questions on the Senate call.

A separate group of White House officials briefed top congressional leaders and key committee chairs in a classified briefing in the Capitol later Monday.

The administration has faced bipartisan skepticism over multiple provisions of the memorandum of understanding — particularly the lifting of oil sanctions and a $300 billion reconstruction fund that many Senate Republicans fear will help fuel Iran’s military and regional proxies.

Rubio and Witkoff sought to ease concerns about the slow reopening of the Strait of Hormuz — the critical trade route whose closure has sparked higher fuel and fertilizer costs. Both officials said more mine removal is required, and Witkoff indicated that Iran broke the terms of the Trump-signed deal by launching a drone attack on a passing ship over the weekend.

They also sought to assure lawmakers that Iran has received no money under the memorandum — especially not directly from American sources. Administration officials have previously pledged in smaller briefings that the reconstruction fund won’t include U.S. funds.

Sen. Steve Daines (R-Mont.) called the Senate briefing a “productive conversation” but said “much of what I heard today is similar to what I heard last week” during a dinner at Vice President JD Vance’s residence.