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Roughly 3.5 million people in Texas, including 1.7 million children, will not benefit from food stamp benefits next month if the government shutdown continues. The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) started notifying state agencies last week that SNAP recipients will not be getting benefits in November if the government fails to reopen by the end of the month. In Texas, this would mean halting more than $614 million in food stamps helping millions of low-income individuals and families put food on the table. Why It Matters The government’s shutdown officially started at midnight on October 1, after Republicans and Democrats in the Senate failed to agree to a deal that would have preserved funding for federal agencies. At the center of the rift between the two groups was health care spending, with Democrats refusing to vote to keep the government funded unless Republicans agreed to reverse Medicaid cuts and extend subsidies for Affordable Care Act plans. While fundamental federal agencies are still operating, many services have been temporarily halted. Around 1.4 million federal employees are currently working without pay or have been put on unpaid leave. The longer the shutdown goes on for, the more services are expected to be affected and the deeper their impact is likely to be on Americans relying on them. What To Know Texas officials started informing recipients on Friday that they will not receive benefits through the Supplemental Food Assistance and Nutrition Program (SNAP) next month if the government shutdown continues after October 27, as reported by the Texas Tribune. In the Lone Star State, the SNAP program is administered by the Texas Health and Human Services (HHSC). The agency has not offered many details to SNAP recipients facing a potential halt to benefits about what they can do to receive assistance, saying they will continue to monitor the situation. Newsweek contacted the HHSC for comment by email on Monday. Texas is hardly the only state in this situation. SNAP benefits in Pennsylvania have already been halted, with Governor Josh Shapiro saying that "the work that is happening in Washington right now is directly hurting communities." State health agencies in North Carolina, Wisconsin and Minnesota have also warned that funding for SNAP benefits may not be available next month if the shutdown continues. All across the nation, about 42 million people rely on SNAP benefits every month to afford their groceries. What People Are Saying A letter written by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) office to state agencies said: "SNAP has funding available for benefits and operations through the month of October. However, if the current lapse in appropriations continues, there will be insufficient funds to pay full November SNAP benefits for approximately 42 million individuals across the Nation." What Happens Next As of Monday, the shutdown was the third-longest in U.S. history and there seemed to be no progress on negotiations between Democrats and Republicans. The Senate is set to reconvene on Monday afternoon to vote for an 11th time on the Republican funding bill.
