More than a dozen states have conveyed the full amount of food stamps for November, with some issuing them after President Donald Trump signed a legislative package that ended the government shutdown.
Connecticut, Hawaii, Kansas, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Washington, West Virginia, and Wisconsin residents have received the full amount of food stamps they were due to receive for November, officials said.
The government reopened this week after Trump signed the funding bill on Nov. 12.
The package includes full funding for the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), which runs the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) with the help of states. SNAP involves lower-income people receiving money for groceries on electronic cards.
Many of the states paid full November benefits before Trump signed the package, after receiving a memorandum from the USDA that stated it would soon complete the actions necessary to issue full benefits for the month.
The USDA reversed course in another directive, but a federal judge blocked that memo.
Other states say they expected all SNAP participants to receive full benefits soon since the government has reopened.
The North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services
said in a statement that full payments would be processed by Friday morning.
Pennsylvania officials
said in a statement that benefits should be paid in full by the end of the week.
The Utah Department of Workforce Services
said full benefits would be made no later than Nov. 15.
Vermont Gov. Phil Scott
said people would receive their benefits on Nov. 17 at the latest.
South Carolina officials
said benefits would be available on electronic cards on Friday for people who were supposed to receive the funds between Nov. 1 and Nov. 14, and that remaining beneficiaries would receive their funds on their normal monthly date.
Food stamps are distributed to households on the same day each month, with the day depending on factors such as when people enrolled in the program. The day of the month
can be as late as the 28th.
A USDA spokesperson told The Epoch Times in an email on Thursday morning that people in most states would receive full November benefits within 24 hours.
USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins
said later in the day that SNAP participants would see the full amount of benefits on or before Nov. 17.
Patrick Penn, a USDA deputy undersecretary,
told states in a Nov. 13 memorandum that they “must take immediate steps to ensure households receive their full November allotments promptly.”
He also said states should proceed with preparing to issue full benefits for December.
Some other states have not laid out a timeline for full benefits to be issued.
The Indiana Family and Social Services Administration, for instance,
said on Thursday that it is taking action to make sure SNAP recipients receive full benefits, but “the exact date when the additional funds will be available is still being finalized.”
“Now that the federal government is officially reopened, we will work to distribute the remaining benefits as soon as the USDA provides final authorization,” Shannon Grotrian, director of the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services Office of Economic Assistance,
said in a statement.
