SNAP Recipients Will Have To Reapply For Benefits Post-Shutdown, Trump’s Agriculture Secretary Says – Blavity
One of the largest disruptions during the federal government shutdown was the disruption of food aid benefits for tens of millions of people around the country. Even though the reopening of the government has come with a renewal of the food aid program, the Trump administration may be creating an extra level of red tape for recipients and may possibly exclude some people from the program.
‘Have everyone reapply for their benefits’
Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins is planning to make all 42 million beneficiaries of the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program reapply in order to continue receiving benefits. That’s the message that Rollins delivered during an appearance on NewsMax. The secretary claimed that a review of the program initiated after she took office has revealed that “5,000 dead people, that was just one month, the number is closer to 186,000 deceased men and women and children in this country are receiving a check.” She also claimed “half a million are getting two” checks. Rollins claimed these statistics came from a review of SNAP data from 29 states, “mostly the red states” that responded to her request for data earlier this year, though she did not explain how she had arrived at these numbers. Rollins said that these stats and the spotlight aimed at SNAP this year are creating “a platform and a trajectory to fundamentally rebuild this program. Have everyone reapply for their benefits.”
Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins has just announced that the entirety of SNAP will be rebuilt and that all users will have to reapply to prove they genuinely need it. pic.twitter.com/9tez7KoBPN— Geepers808 (@GeepersNFT) November 17, 2025
Legal fights and disputed interpretations of data
Rollins gave similar statistics during a Monday morning appearance on Fox Business Network, adding that her review had found thousands of individuals receiving SNAP benefits in multiple states, with some allegedly getting assistance from six different states at once.
Brooke Rollins on food stamps: "We know the SNAP program is rife with fraud… what we've found is stunning. 186,000 deceased individuals receiving benefits, 500,000 getting 2 times the benefit, we found thousands of individuals getting benefits in 6 different states. It is one… pic.twitter.com/HeQuRvC3JA— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) November 17, 2025
Rollins also referenced an ongoing legal fight with Democratic-led states such as California that have so far refused to hand over personal data on SNAP recipients to the Department of Agriculture, arguing that the Trump administration intends to use the data in ways that are prohibited by law, such as using it for immigration enforcement. California and Illinois, two of the states in litigation with the Trump administration, also claim that the analysis of the data already supplied by red states does not justify the Department of Agriculture’s conclusions about widespread “fraud and abuse” in the SNAP program.
Republican agenda to roll back SNAP continues
The Trump administration has not given additional details for how the reapplication process would work or when to expect such a policy to go into effect. Meanwhile, many states are expected to finally distribute full SNAP benefits for November. The Trump administration had fought several court orders to draw from various sources to fund SNAP during the government shutdown, but the deal to end the shutdown that was signed into law last week restored SNAP and other food aid, even increasing money for some programs. However, even before any reapplication process for SNAP begins, many recipients may soon see their benefits cut off or reduced due to restrictions and other changes made by the GOP’s One Big, Beautiful Bill.
Together, these changes indicate that the Trump administration is determined to roll back SNAP. Although the legal battle over making current payments from the program has ended with the reopening of the federal government, other struggles are continuing as the administration attempts to use fraud accusations to accomplish its goal of rolling back food aid.
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