A federal appeals court late Sunday rejected the Trump administration’s bid to halt an order requiring full Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) payments during the government shutdown.
The three-judge panel on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit ruled a judge did not abuse his discretion in finding the government’s plan for partial food stamps payments would cause unacceptable delays.
“It also knew full well that making partial payments would be technically difficult, as it had never been done before,” U.S. Circuit Judge Julie Rikelman wrote for the unanimous panel.
“But it proceeded to do nothing to attempt to solve that problem over the following three weeks. It made no calculations, prepared no tables, and took no other logistical steps to prepare for a shortfall,” Rikelman continued.
It keeps in place U.S. District Judge John McConnell’s requirement that officials fill the remaining gap for November SNAP payments by transferring roughly $4 billion in child nutrition funds, which the Trump administration argued would unacceptably put those programs at risk.
The payments remain on temporary hold under a Friday night ruling from Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, but the appeals court’s decision begins a 48-hour clock for Jackson’s hold to expire.
It also comes as lawmakers on Capitol Hill move closer to reopening the government. Just before the appeals ruling, the Senate advanced a vehicle to end the 41-day shutdown after a group of Democrats joined Republicans to provide the necessary votes.
The 1st Circuit panel comprised two appointees of former President Biden — Rikelman and U.S. Circuit Judge Gustavo Gelpí — and U.S. Circuit Judge David Barron, an appointee of former President Obama.
The Trump administration appealed after McConnell, another Obama appointee, ruled the administration was acting arbitrarily and capriciously by not transferring the child nutrition funds to fully fund SNAP during the shutdown.
Earlier, McConnell had ruled the administration needed to, at minimum, deplete a $5 billion SNAP emergency fund.
It was not enough to cover November benefits, and McConnell said officials needed to devise a way to recalculate partial payments expeditiously or tap other funding sources to fill the remaining gap. After the government said partial benefits would cause delays, the judge ordered the full payments be sent by last Friday.
“That unprecedented injunction makes a mockery of the separation of powers,” the Justice Department wrote in court filings.
“The core power of Congress is that of the purse, while the Executive is tasked with allocating limited resources across competing priorities. But here, the court below took the current shutdown as effective license to declare a federal bankruptcy and appoint itself the trustee, charged with picking winners and losers among those seeking some part of the limited pool of remaining federal funds,” the filing continued.
