Nutrition programs face funding shortfalls as US government shutdown enters third week

Due to the government shutdown, now the second longest at day 23, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) will run out of funding for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) in November.

Food Research & Action Center’s (FRAC) interim director, Gina Plata-Nino, Doctor of Law, states: “Allowing hunger to deepen during a shutdown is not an inevitability; it is a policy choice.” 

“The Trump administration has demonstrated urgency in funding other priorities, but not the same commitment to protecting low-income families’ access to food through SNAP. What is missing is the political will to prioritize the families, children, older adults, and workers who rely on SNAP to get the nutrition they need.”

Find alternative funding

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities warns that the lack of funding will leave over 40 million low-income people, or one in eight, without food assistance. This is 16 million children, eight million older adults, and four million people with disabilities. 

The nonpartisan budgetary research and policy institute calls for the administration to release two-thirds of the funds needed for a whole month of benefits from SNAP’s contingency fund.

“USDA should use its discretion to transfer whatever amount possible to augment the SNAP contingency funding using the same mechanism as it used for WIC (Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children), or any other available legal authority, and come as close as possible to funding full November SNAP benefits,” it argues.

Plata-Nino also points out that Republican and Democratic administrations found ways to prevent SNAP shutdowns or similar situations in 2013, 2018–2019, and 2023. They used contingency funds, carryover appropriations, and short-term adjustments.

She adds that if the administration does not fund SNAP, benefits could be delayed but reimbursed once the shutdown ends.

Bolstering WIC with new act

This month, USDA transferred US$300 million to WIC, funded through October, from last calendar year’s leftover amount from the Child Nutrition budget account, which supports school meal programs. 

Advocates warn that prolonged political gridlock is deepening food insecurity and silencing national nutrition data collection efforts.However, WIC’s future remains uncertain beyond October. It serves approximately seven million pregnant, postpartum, and breastfeeding women, infants, and children up to five years old. This is nearly 40% of all US infants. 

Earlier this month, 70 Democrats introduced the WIC Benefits Protection Act to safeguard funding for WIC regardless of partisan gridlock or funding issues.

“It’s unacceptable that infants, young children, and expectant mothers might lose essential nutrition assistance because Republicans shut down the government,” says Early Childhood Education and Special Education Subcommittee ranking member Suzanne Bonamici. 

“WIC services have never lapsed during a government shutdown, and they shouldn’t lapse now. We must protect WIC funding today and in the future. Kids and expectant moms need nutritious meals. I call on Republicans to come back to Washington, DC, and work together to open the government while preserving important programs that affect the health and well-being of Americans.”

Meanwhile, the One Big Beautiful Bill’s impact on Medicaid or SNAP eligibility will take away WIC access for around 3 million women and 8.2 million children. The bill slashed federal funding for SNAP by US$186 billion through 2034.

Hunger made invisible

The Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) has called out the administration for using the government shutdown as an excuse to fire the unit within the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that collects diet information through the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES).

Millions of Americans risk losing access to food assistance as the government shutdown stalls SNAP and WIC funding.The American Society for Nutrition (ASN) also calls on the administration to immediately rescind the firings. NHANES studies US adults and children’s health and nutritional status through interviews, physical examinations, and laboratory tests.

Its data are used to guide federal policymaking in areas including food labeling, food fortification, food safety, dietary guidance, tracking progress toward national nutrition and health objectives, and establishing nutrition research priorities, according to ASN. This influences billion-dollar federal investments in research, policy, and programs.

“It should go without saying that if you want to make Americans healthier, you have to have a basic understanding of what they actually eat and how their health is changing over time,” says the nonprofit’s senior science policy associate Alla Hill.

“Not only is NHANES used in the Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee’s analyses — to assess how US diets align with federal nutrition guidance through the Healthy Eating Index, for example — it is also used in developing the Dietary Reference Intakes, which set nutrient recommendations for individuals in the US and Canada.”

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is reportedly set to release the new dietary guidelines this month. Though he encourages healthy eating, he will also recommend animal-based foods that are high in trans and saturated fats. 

“New dietary guidelines that are common sense, that stress the need to eat saturated fats of dairy, of good meat, of fresh meat and vegetables … when we release those, it will give everybody the rationale for driving it into our schools,” he comments.

However, CSPI and various experts have warned that high saturated fat consumption raises heart disease risk, warning that changing it in guidelines could be detrimental to public health and the millions.

Last month, the Trump administration also scrapped the annual USDA Household Food Security Reports, which is are essential tool for tracking hunger in the US.

“The firing of the NHANES staff is another example and an indication that the administration would rather push its political agenda than collect the data necessary to address the very real problems it has identified,” adds Hill.

Nutrition Insight will continue to cover this developing story.