Judge strikes down Trump plan to slash food stamps
WASHINGTON — A federal judge on Sunday formally struck downa Trump administration attempt to end food stamp benefits for nearly 700,000 unemployed people, blocking as “arbitrary and capricious” the first of three such planned measures to restrict the federal food safety net.
In a 67-page opinion, Chief U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell of the District of Columbia condemned the Agriculture Department for not justifying or even addressing the impact of the sweeping change on states, saying its shortcomings had been placed in stark relief amid the coronavirus pandemic, during which unemployment has quadrupled and rosters of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program have grown by more than 17 percent with more than 6 million new enrollees.
The rule “at issue in this litigation radically and abruptly alters decades of regulatory practice, leaving States scrambling and exponentially increasing food insecurity for tens of thousands of Americans,” Howell wrote, adding that the Agriculture Department “has been icily silent about how many (adults) would have been denied SNAP benefits had the changes sought … been in effect while the pandemic rapidly spread across the country.”
The judge concluded that the department’s “utter failure to address the issue renders the agency action arbitrary and capricious.”
Howell’s ruling granted summary judgment to a coalition of 19 states along with D.C., New York City and private groupswho sued to stop the new rule, finalized in December, to eliminate states’ discretion to waive work requirements in distressed economic areas.
Howell in March temporarily enjoined the proposal, the same day President Donald Trump declared the coronavirus outbreak a national emergency. Congress then waived the requirement for the duration of the emergency as part of economic relief legislation, and the Trump administration suspended its planned April implementation date.
However, the Agriculture Department appealed the judge’s earlier order, and absent court intervention the rule would take full effect at the end of the state of emergency. Spokesmen for the department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
More than 1,900,000 Texas families filed for one-time pandemic relief food benefits and about 80 percent were approved.
Two other proposed rule changes, not yet final, aim to cap deductions for utility allowance and to limit access to SNAP for working poor families.
A study by the Urban Institute shows the combined impact of these rules would cut 3.7 million people from SNAP in an average month. Benefits would be reduced for millions more, and 982,000 students would lose automatic access to free or reduced-price school meals.