Funding SNAP could take months, Trump admin official says
Using emergency funds to pay for reduced SNAP benefits could take "a few weeks to up to several months," a top USDA official told a federal judge in a sworn court filing on Monday.
In addition to the delay, the Trump administration also said it was $4 billion short of the expected $8 billion cost to fund SNAP for the month of November, in part, because they are declining to tap an additional bucket of emergency funds held by the USDA.

"Defendants have worked diligently to comply with the Court's order on the short timeline provided by the Court and during a government shutdown," DOJ lawyers wrote in a filing on Monday, committing to spend $4.65 billion on SNAP.
The disclosure comes after a federal judge in Rhode Island ordered the Trump administration to use emergency funds to pay for SNAP amid an ongoing government shutdown by Wednesday. Following the court order on Friday, Trump said it would be his "honor" to fund the food assistance program.
-ABC News' Peter Charalambous and Stephen Portnoy







