America’s food banks are facing a looming crisis under President Donald Trump‘s administration as proposed changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits get closer to becoming a reality.
In the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, food banks have already experienced a surge in demand as Americans grapple with rising living costs. Despite low unemployment, inflation has outpaced wage growth, and grocery prices have surged nearly 28 percent over five years, straining household budgets.
The Atlanta Community Food Bank told Newsweek that over the last three years, the number of people it serves across its 29-county network has increased by 60 percent—now helping 240,000 households every month.
America’s food banks, which helped feed an estimated 50 million people in 2023, are now set to face another challenge. SNAP is facing myriad changes under the current administration, including state-levied restrictions on what can be bought using the anti-poverty benefit, and looming budget cuts ordered by Congress that could also push up the number of people facing reliance on charity to feed themselves and their families.
“Food banks are a critical part of the United States emergency food system specifically developed to fill in the holes of federal food aid directed to individuals,” Valerie Imbruce, director of Washington College’s Center for Environment and Society, told Newsweek. “They already have a difficult time providing what people need with food insecurity growing.”
Photo Illustration by Newsweek
Budget Cuts
SNAP, otherwise known as “food stamps,” is available nationwide to support low- and no-income households buy groceries. In 2023, the program assisted an average of 42.1 million people per month, or around 12.6 percent of the population. For fiscal year 2025, SNAP recipients are expected to receive an average of $187 per month per person, which equates to about $6.16 per day.
A recently passed Republican budget resolution does not mention SNAP directly, but it does order the House Agriculture Committee, which oversees the program, to cut $230 billion in spending over the next decade. A significant chunk of these cuts are expected to come from SNAP, and exactly how the money will be saved is not set in stone.
In a GOP budget memorandum published earlier this year, plans included expanding work requirements (saving $5 billion), limiting changes in SNAP’s cost to the rate of inflation ($36 billion) and capping the amount of benefits available for households with more than six people ($2 billion).
But “lawmakers cannot cut $230 billion—or anything close to that amount—from SNAP without slashing benefits, restricting eligibility, or some combination of both,” the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) has reported.
None of the changes taking place at federal and state level have been implemented yet. Federal budget negotiations will continue, with legislation expected to be passed later this year.
But food banks remain on the alert, at a time when hunger across the U.S. is already at dire levels. Some 47.4 million people lived in households experiencing food insecurity last year, an increase of 3.2 million compared to 2022, and 13.5 million compared to 2021, according to the Food Research and Action Center. Data for 2024 is not yet available.
Ivy Enoch, SNAP policy and training lead at Hunger Free Vermont, explained to Newsweek that if the current budget proposals become law further down the line, “there are really only three options in front of the House Agriculture Committee: drastically cut SNAP benefits, severely limit eligibility and take SNAP away from people, or shift costs to states which will ultimately result in the same thing: taking grocery money away from every single SNAP participant.”
What’s more, the CBPP has estimated some 9 million SNAP recipients could lose their benefits as a result of the budget cuts—many of whom may be forced to turn to food banks to feed their families.
Food banks and charitable organizations are all too aware that this could impact them. Feeding America, which runs the nation’s largest food bank network, has said charitable organizations “cannot absorb the large increase in demand that the proposed cuts will create.”
Elizabeth Ford, founder and CEO at BetterALife, a Virginia-based nonprofit organization that provides children and families with food and educational assistance, said that previous cuts to SNAP benefits show an increase in food bank usage is likely to happen if the proposal becomes law.
“After the last cut, when the amounts from the COVID increase were removed, we increased by 40 percent of families,” she told Newsweek.
“If SNAP is cut again, we will definitely see an increase in demand and need. As of now one in 7 children is food insecure. This number will go up, more children will struggle—depression, hunger and more parts of their lives will spiral out of control.”
State Controls on SNAP Foods
Along with the budget cuts, numerous states are currently considering or have requested permission from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA)—which funds the SNAP program and sets some of its rules—to bar recipients from being able to make purchases of soda and candy using their benefits.
Waivers sent by some states to cut unhealthy foods from SNAP are currently being considered by the USDA, with its Secretary Brooke Rollins indicating she is likely to approve them. The call for waivers is the latest chapter in a yearslong push by Republicans to limit what SNAP recipients should be able to buy using their benefits.
Some of these are still being considered by state lawmakers, while others have requested a waiver. Arizona, Iowa, Louisiana, Missouri, Michigan, Montana, Texas, Tennessee, Utah, and West Virginia are all considering legislation, while Arkansas and Indiana have both sent waiver requests. In Idaho, a bill has been signed by Republican Governor Brad Little to get the ball rolling on a waiver request, but this has not yet been submitted.
Ford said the cuts to food eligibility will also cause an increase in the number of people seeking charitable food assistance.
“Healthier food, though good for you, is around three times more expensive than junk food,” she explained. “Most families living in food insecurity live off junk food because they can purchase more food for the same cost.”
Imbruce agrees. “People already feel, and are, precarious; the new scrutiny on SNAP amplifies that feeling and doesn’t address the real problem that fresh, healthy food is unaffordable for many,” she said.
“These controls come at a time when the inflation we are all experiencing on food has rendered current levels of SNAP benefits to already be insufficient. The weekly allowance for a family of four on SNAP is $192.84 and the average national cost of a week’s worth of groceries is $226.20.”
Preexisting Problems
Food banks have already been hit by funding cuts mandated by the Trump administration. The USDA’s Emergency Food Assistance Program, one of the agency’s core nutrition programs that buys food from farmers and sends it to food banks, has had half—$500 million—of its funding paused. An additional $500 million has been cut from the Local Food Purchase Assistance program, which provides funding for food banks.
John Sayles, CEO of Vermont Foodbank, said the impacts of these federal budget cuts are already trickling down.
“We’re asking the state for more funding, yet the state is facing federal cuts from multiple directions and can’t make up the difference either,” he told Newsweek.
“Economic instability is what drives demand for charitable food. With federal food to food banks already declining, and instability rising, the Vermont Foodbank will be increasingly challenged to show up for our neighbors.”
“We don’t have the funding or facilities to double our distribution, and even if we did, we couldn’t meet our neighbors’ needs for the food they need, when and where they need it like SNAP does,” Sayles said.