The food crisis is here

State of play: Low-income families are scrambling to figure out how to pay for food, and facing some painful choices in the coming days: deciding whether they can pay rent or other bills or skipping meals so their children can eat.

• Some will have to choose between going to work or standing in line at the local food bank, where need has been growing all year.

Where it stands: After two federal courts forced its hand, the White House now says it will pay partial SNAP payments for the 42 million Americans who rely on the food program, blaming the government shutdown.

• It's not yet clear when those payments are going out — it could be weeks, as different states update systems to accommodate changes.
• "It will depend on the state," says Katie Bergh, a senior policy analyst at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. "They've never had to implement reductions like this before."

"Any suffering is occurring directly at the hands of Senate Democrats, who have voted against a clean bipartisan CR 13 times despite President Trump's repeated calls to reopen the government and allow federal workers to get paid," White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly tells Axios.

• "The administration has been uplifting families by lowering costs and creating jobs while simultaneously eliminating waste, fraud and abuse across many programs."

Zoom out: Those who rely on SNAP to pay for groceries — mostly children and elderly Americans, as well as a large share of disabled people — typically spend all that money in the month it's received.

• Now, they're trying to plan around uncertainty.

"Right now my fridge is bare minimum," says Ashleigh Lijon, who lives in Federal Way, Washington, with her six children and husband.

• "I have about one week's benefits left."
• When asked how she's going to pay for food once that runs out, Lijon says: "I honestly have no idea."
• The closest food bank is 45 minutes away, she says. And the lines are long. In the past week, she's had to leave to pick up her kids without getting anything.

"Workers are going to making hard decisions — paying rent or buying food even buying medication or feeding their children," says Terrysa Guerra, the co-executive director of United for Respect, a group that advocates for retail workers — many of whom receive SNAP.

• "We've heard from single mothers who say SNAP is getting them by; without it, they wouldn't be able to fill their kids' bellies," she says.

Zoom in: The calls to a hunger hotline operated by the Capital Area Food Bank, which serves Virginia, Maryland and Washington, D.C., tripled in the last week alone, says the organization's CEO, Radha Muthiah.

• Food distribution targets were increased by 20% this year to meet rising need.
• The many federal workers who've been pushed out of work or furloughed added to the demand.

What to watch: Families are making hard choices to pay for food that will reverberate for lifetimes — pulling money from long-term savings and retirement benefits, Muthiah says.

• Family and friends are stepping in. Grace Robinson, who is disabled and living with her parents in Cresco, Pennsylvania, says they'll help make up for the $100 a month she's been getting in SNAP — they're already stretched financially, she says.

The big picture: The SNAP crisis is just the latest blow to food insecurity this year. Other factors:

• The end of increased pandemic-era supports for lower-income Americans.
• The Trump administration ending a program that funded food purchasing at food banks.

Between the lines: The Trump administration has said that grocery prices are coming down, and that it is working on reducing them. "President Trump recognizes he inherited the worst inflation crisis in a generation from Joe Biden, and that is why he has tasked his admin with fixing it," White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Axios last month.

• "Grocery prices are coming down, such as egg prices — which have plummeted by nearly 80% — and we recognize there is more work to be done."

Still, it will be hard to measure rising food insecurity — a report measuring hunger in America in 2024 hasn't been released this year because of the shutdown.

• And the White House said it would discontinue tracking the data going forward.
• A White House official tells Axios that it can get a good read on food insecurity through various measures of economic data, and that the food Insecurity Report was redundant and wasteful.
• More than 70% of EBT cards (used for SNAP benefits) have funding on them, they noted.
• SNAP cuts in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act are expected to decrease the number of Americans who get these food benefits.

The bottom line: More people are going hungry and facing hard choices, as the federal government cuts back food benefits, and higher grocery prices amp up the pain.

Editor's note: This story has been updated with comment from the White House.