By MIRA BEINART
Capital News Service
Maryland’s attorney general joined 24 other states and the District of Columbia on Tuesday in a lawsuit against the Trump administration over its upcoming suspension of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.
The lawsuit, filed against the United States Department of Agriculture and its secretary, Brooke Rollins, alleges that the temporary defunding of SNAP is unlawful.
“Time is running out to prevent hundreds of thousands of Maryland families from losing access to food,” said Attorney General Anthony Brown in a written statement. “We’re taking the Trump administration to court because Maryland’s children and families deserve better than a federal government that chooses to let them go hungry despite having the resources to help.”
More than 680,000 Marylanders rely on funding from SNAP to feed themselves and their families every month, according to the Maryland Department of Human Services. Nearly 270,000 of these SNAP recipients are children.
Ten days after the government shutdown and the start of the new federal fiscal year, the USDA sent a letter to SNAP agencies across the country indicating that there is not enough money to fund November SNAP benefits to the more than 42 million Americans who rely on them.
The webpage dedicated to the Lapse of Funding Plan, which includes SNAP-specific contingency funds, has been taken down from the USDA website. These funds are available to be used to fund November SNAP benefits, according to a letter to the USDA secretary, signed by 214 U.S. congressional representatives.
“This lapse will…put unnecessary strain on state and local governments and community organizations, as families increasingly rely on emergency services and local food pantries that are already struggling to fill a growing nutrition gap,” said the attorney general.
Food insecurity has remained high since the pandemic in 2020, said Allison Schnitzer, the co-executive director of the Montgomery County Food Council, an organization that provides capacity building and technical assistance to food assistance providers in Montgomery County.
“People are going to be [utilizing] food assistance providers in ways we haven’t seen since Covid,” Schnitzer said. “An already-stretched food assistance system is going to be stretched way beyond its capacity.”
Food banks across Maryland have seen an increase in first-time clients since the federal government shutdown in October.
Mid-County United Ministries, a food pantry and emergency assistance program in Wheaton, has seen a significant increase in new clients, walk-ins and referrals from schools this month.
Although the organization does not explicitly ask about income or employment status, many conversations with clients indicate that they have been affected by the government shutdown, said Dayna Brown, the executive director at the food pantry.
The USDA’s website indicates that SNAP benefits will not be issued starting Nov. 1. The banner on the website reads: “Bottom line, the well has run dry.”
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