11/10/2025
Who Gets Hurt When SNAP Benefits are Stopped?
By Levi Rickert November 09, 2025
Opinion.
One in four Native Americans utilize the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, often referred to as SNAP or food stamps. Native Americans live at the poverty level twice the national average. Among Native American SNAP recipients, most are elders, children or disabled individuals.
About 540,000 Native Americans receive SNAP benefits. They are among 42 million Americans who depend on the program for food.
On Friday, the Trump administration’s Department of Justice filed a 32-page motion with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit seeking to overturn U.S. District Judge John McConnell’s order requiring full SNAP benefits for the month of November. The Trump administration opposes funding SNAP benefits during the federal government shutdown that began on Oct. 1.
On page 22 of the appeal, the DOJ argues “the district court's order threatens significant and irreparable harm to the government which outweighs any claimed injury to plaintiffs.”
Some might take that to mean that the Justice Department is contending that the government's spending of money to feed the poor and needy is more harmful than the hunger faced by SNAP recipients. The “irreparable harm” they cite is the government's inability to recover the money once it's spent.
On Friday afternoon, the appeals court declined to impose an immediate halt to the district judge’s order pending a more thorough review of the case. Trump’s DOJ did not stop there to make sure the hungry went unfed. It filed an emergency appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, a Biden appointee, issued a temporary pause that will remain in effect until the circuit court issues a judgment on the matter.
This isn’t the first time politicians have attacked programs that help poor people.
In his 1976 bid against President Gerald R. Ford for the Republican nomination, then candidate Ronald Reagan popularized the term “welfare queen.”
The term appeared in media reports in 1974, with a Chicago Tribune article that fall identifying a woman named Linda Taylor by that label. Reagan used her story in his 1976 and 1980 presidential campaigns to attack social programs.
Taylor, an African American woman from Chicago, committed extensive welfare fraud using dozens of aliases and addresses.
Reagan's campaign used the Chicago Tribune story in his campaigns. Though he never used her name, he frequently mentioned the “woman from Chicago” to make his case for welfare reform.
Reagan exaggerated the fraud, claiming Taylor took in hundreds of thousands of tax-free cash income, claiming in one radio interview that her take was estimated at a million dollars. Prosecutors proved she stole about $8,000 in welfare fraud. Taylor was convicted and served time for her crimes.
The rhetoric we’re hearing today echoes the old myth of the “welfare queen” — a stereotype steeped in racism. These words were never about one person; they were a political weapon aimed at shaming poor people, particularly people of color. Today, that same spirit lurks in the renewed efforts to cut or delay SNAP payments.
The implication is clear: some Americans are considered less worthy of help.
Policymakers and pundits debating SNAP often forget the real people behind the acronym.
Native people know what food insecurity looks like. Many reservations are food deserts where the nearest grocery store is miles away, and prices for basic items can be double what they are in nearby cities. SNAP helps fill that gap, providing families with the means to put nutritious food on their tables. Without it, hunger grows and so do the health disparities that already burden our tribal communities.
In Indian Country, SNAP is not a handout — it’s a lifeline. For generations, Native communities have faced barriers to food access, economic opportunity and land rights. To imply that Native families are undeserving of food support is to ignore centuries of broken promises and imposed poverty.
Dignity should never depend on a grocery receipt. Food security is not a privilege; it is a human right.
As federal courts weigh the fate of November SNAP payments, let’s remember who stands to lose the most if benefits are delayed. Behind every statistic is a Native family, a child, or an elder who deserves more than judgment—they deserve justice.
Who gets hurt when SNAP benefits are stopped? The working poor, elders, children and disabled individuals.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) needs to get the House of Representatives back to Washington and back to working with the Senate and White House to get the government reopened.
Perhaps, National Congress of American Indians President Mark Macarro’s statement on the matter says it best:
“If the United States can simply suspend food during a shutdown, then every promise to safeguard our rights and well being becomes conditional on political convenience…Let this be the last time that Native American Heritage Month opens with hunger instead of honor.”
Thayék gde nwéndëmen - We are all related.
