Families in Limbo After Supreme Court Order Interrupts Food Stamp Payments

In New Jersey, officials expressed fear that the federal government could target the firm that manages the cards used by food stamp recipients to purchase groceries, and potentially prevent the vendor from drawing down federal funds. In many other states, including Louisiana and Texas, there was no updated information at all.

Even in states that had raced to release benefits in full, there emerged early signs of disruptions. That included in New York, which announced on Friday — hours before the Supreme Court intervened — that it would furnish long-awaited grocery aid to residents.

At the Empire Grocery & Deli on Ninth Avenue, near 25th Street in Manhattan, Duwanna Alford swiped her E.B.T. card on Saturday morning, hoping she could use the $298 in her account to buy a breakfast sandwich for her 9-year-old grandson. But when she looked down at the payment screen, Ms. Alford, 58, saw her card had been declined.

A frequent visitor to that deli for more than a decade, she immediately pulled out her phone and called the hotline for SNAP, which administers the E.B.T. cards. Ms. Alford said she got a busy signal.

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/08/us/politics/families-food-stamps-supreme-court-order.html


I am one of those in Pa. whose November SNAP benefits posted a day ago.

* edit - card is working.