Vice President JD Vance criticized an Obama-appointed judge’s ruling that ordered the Trump administration to make full Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) payments for November despite the Democrats’ ongoing government shutdown.
Last week, two Obama-appointed U.S. district court judges—Indira Talwani in Boston and John McConnell in Providence—ruled that SNAP benefits could not be cut off amid the government shutdown led by Democrats. Judge McConnell specifically ordered the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) on Friday to resume benefit payments, either in full or in part, “as soon as possible.”
In response, the Trump administration announced it would comply by using $4.65 billion in contingency funds. This move would allow for partial payments covering roughly half of each eligible household’s SNAP benefits for November.
USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins, echoing President Donald Trump’s stance, emphasized on Monday that the administration does not want vulnerable Americans to suffer. She stated the USDA is working to “get partial allotments to SNAP households,” noting it will take several weeks to execute these partial payments fully.
Rollins added, “Once obstructionist Democrats reopen the government, FULL benefits can get to families without delay.”
Democracy Forward, an anti-Trump organization representing plaintiffs in the case overseen by Judge McConnell, filed an emergency request on Tuesday. They asked the court to compel the administration to fund SNAP benefits in full immediately.
In their motion, Democracy Forward argued:
“Because it is now clear that due to Defendants’ course of conduct, and by their own admission, undertaking a partial payment plan at this point cannot meet the Court’s directives or adequately remedy the harm Plaintiffs are suffering, the Court should grant Plaintiffs’ motion to enforce and should temporarily enjoin and compel Defendants to release the withheld funding, in its entirety, for November SNAP benefits.”
The USDA has previously indicated it will not tap Section 32 funds, which are supplied by tariff revenues and designated for Child Nutrition Programs. These programs feed at least 29 million American children and are distinct from SNAP benefits.
“We’re not going to do it under the orders of a federal judge,” the USDA stated in a court filing. “Section 32 Child Nutrition Program funds are not a contingency fund for SNAP. Using billions of dollars from Child Nutrition for SNAP would leave an unprecedented gap in Child Nutrition funding that Congress has never had to fill with annual appropriations, and USDA cannot predict what Congress will do under these circumstances.”
Judge McConnell cited recent social media posts by President Trump, including a Tuesday tweet suggesting that SNAP benefits would only be distributed “when the Radical Left Democrats open up government, which they can easily do, and not before.” The judge used these posts as evidence of the government’s “intent to defy” his Friday order and questioned the sincerity of the USDA’s arguments against using Section 32 funds.
“This Court is not naïve to the administration’s true motivations,” Judge McConnell wrote. “Far from being concerned with Child Nutrition funding, these statements make clear that the administration is withholding full SNAP benefits for political purposes. Such ‘unjustifiable partisanship’ has infected the USDA’s decision-making, rendering it arbitrary and capricious.”
Judge McConnell has previously faced criticism over his “ties and massive contributions to Democratic politics,” as reported by WJAR.
During a roundtable with Asian leaders at the White House on Thursday, Vice President Vance condemned the ruling. He called it “an absurd ruling because you have a federal judge effectively telling us what we have to do in the midst of a Democrat government shutdown.”
Vance continued, “What we’d like to do is for the Democrats to open up the government. Of course then we can fund SNAP, and we can also do a lot of other good things for the American people. But in the midst of a shutdown, we can’t have a federal court telling the president how he has to triage the situation.”
He added, “We’re trying to keep as much going as possible. The president and the entire administration are working on that, but we’re not going to do it under the orders of a federal judge. We’re going to do it according to what we think we have to do to comply with the law, of course, but also to actually make the government work for people in the midst of the Democratic government shutdown.”
The Trump administration has appealed the Obama-appointed judge’s ruling to the First Circuit Court of Appeals.
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https://www.conservativereview.com/absurd-jd-vance-blasts-activist-obama-judge-s-apparent-overreach-on-snap-handouts-amid-democrat-shutdown-2674275044.html
