NEW YORK (WABC) — SNAP recipients are struggling to make ends meet with the program halted as the government shutdown — the longest ever — continues.<\/p>\n
SNAP helps nearly 42 million Americans feed their families — low-income working folks, senior citizens, the disabled and others who qualify.<\/p>\n
“Innocent people don’t need to suffer because you have two parties in Congress that can’t agree,” said SNAP recipient Patricia Brooks, a retired cat fancier who has spent the last six years volunteering at a local food pantry.<\/p>\n
“It’s giving back,” she said of her food distribution work. “We’re getting a lot more people than usual.”<\/p>\n
Brooks is one of those tens of millions of Americans who will feel even more of a pinch at the grocery store as the government shutdown continues.<\/p>\n
Around the 7th of every month, she usually receives $200 in SNAP benefits for groceries.<\/p>\n
“I never paid $10 for a carton of eggs before. I even saw mayonnaise for $8 in another grocery store,” she said.<\/p>\n
President Donald Trump said Tuesday that no SNAP benefits will go out to Americans until after the government reopens — a day after the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), which oversees the program, said in court it would make partial payments to recipients.<\/p>\n
A legal battle is now brewing between a coalition of community organizations and the government over the partial funding. Two federal judges have ordered the government to use emergency funds to fund the program.<\/p>\n
In the meantime, food banks and community organizations are feeling the weight of the shutdown<\/a> as they try to feed their communities.<\/p>\n “We’re the ones picking up the slack for that… and they’re still getting paid. Doesn’t seem fair,” Brooks told Eyewitness News.<\/p>\n