WASHINGTON — The pain of a U.S. government shutdown is poised to intensify this week as the funding lapse nears a full month with no resolution in sight.
A series of deadlines in the coming days could have negative consequences for ordinary Americans, cutting off food assistance for low-income individuals and families, raising health insurance premiums for millions on Obamacare, and depriving air-traffic controllers, TSA agents and other federal workers of paychecks.
Here are four ways the pain is about to hit Americans:
Food assistance will be cut off
SNAP benefits, formerly known as food stamps, are slated to dry up on Nov. 1 without congressional action, impacting an estimated 40 million low-income Americans across red and blue states.
New York, Texas and Florida are each home to about 3 million SNAP beneficiaries, according to KFF, a nonpartisan research group.
“This is the biggest pressure point that we’ve seen in 28 days,” said Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville, whose state of Alabama has about 750,000 SNAP beneficiaries. “I think Democrats are getting a little bit tight right now. It’s their constituents — a lot of them — in some of these inner cities that are gonna need SNAP to survive … And they’re getting a lot of calls.”
“A lot of people need to go back to work — a lot of young men that are on SNAP that should be working,” Tuberville added.
We’d like to hear from you about how you’re experiencing the government shutdown, whether you’re a federal employee who can’t work right now, a person who relies on federal benefits like SNAP, or someone who is feeling the effects of other shuttered services in your everyday life. Please contact us at tips@nbcuni.com or reach out to us here.
Sen. John Boozman, R-Ark., chairman of the Agriculture Committee that oversees SNAP, said millions of American families will be harmed if the government doesn’t reopen by Nov. 1.
“It will make their lives more difficult. And, you know, the bottom line is, we need to quit holding these people hostage,” said Boozman, co-chair of the Hunger Caucus. “We have a clean CR. Sen. Schumer needs to open the government — that’s the solution to the problem.”
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., however, scoffed at the suggestion that SNAP benefits are a partisan pressure point.
“Starving children will put pressure on members of Congress? Well, that’s a good moral position,” he said, while emphasizing that the Department of Agriculture has a $5 billion “emergency fund set aside for exactly this purpose” and argued it is obligated to use it to preserve SNAP benefits.
Democratic leaders in 25 states and the District of Columbia on Tuesday sued USDA, arguing just that. They asked a federal judge to compel USDA to keep SNAP going as long as it has contingency funding. Some states are dipping into their own emergency funds to provide support for SNAP during the shutdown as well.
Apart from SNAP, it's unknown if the Trump administration will be able to find alternate funding for a critical nutrition program for women, infants and children (WIC), after Trump this month tapped into $300 million in tariff revenue to keep WIC running.
And as of Nov. 1, Head Start — and the thousands of preschool children who depend on it — may be in limbo as money runs out for the popular program that provides free learning, health screenings and meals to young children from low-income families.
Soaring health care costs
Open enrollment for the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare, begins on Nov. 1, a month before subsidies that have helped keep premium costs low are set to expire. Insurers have set higher rates for 2026 in case those subsidies aren’t renewed, with some Americans seeing their premiums double or triple for next year.
If Congress acts soon to extend the money, reversing the sticker shock for enrollees will be complicated, but insurers can find ways to lower the bills for them next year. Still, the parties do not appear close to a resolution.
The central Democratic demand during the shutdown battle has been to extend those funds, which cost about $35 billion per year and cap insurance premiums for “benchmark” plans on the ACA exchanges at 8.5% of an enrollee’s income.
