WASHINGTON – A federal judge this week temporarily blocked the U.S. Department of Agriculture from plans to freeze $129 million in funds to Minnesota, a cutoff that would have impacted the state’s food stamp program.
Citing fraud, USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins announced the freeze last week. Last month, she also threatened to cut off all Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) funding for Hennepin, Ramsey, Washington and Wright counties because the state has not recertified all the recipients in those counties.
Rollins also said all federal money to implement the food stamp program in Minnesota, which totals almost $900 million a year, could be in peril.
But U.S. District Court Judge Laura Provinzino granted the state a preliminary injunction that bars the USDA from cutting off any funds to Minnesota, including the $129 million announced last week – at least for now.
“We have won yet another battle in the Trump administration’s war on Minnesota,” Attorney General Keith Ellison said in a statement. “Before any of us in the state are Republicans or Democrats, we are Minnesotans, and it should shock and disgust us that this president is trying to take food off the table of half a million of our neighbors.”
Yet the issue won’t be resolved until Provinzino rules on a lawsuit Ellison filed against the USDA last month after Rollins demanded the SNAP recipient recertifications.
In Minnesota, counties administer the SNAP program and, according to Rollins’ directive, each of the four counties involved would have to review the eligibility of tens of thousands of recipients – as well as conduct in-person interviews – within 30 days. If the counties did not comply, their residents would lose benefits.
The state told the court it would be impossible to recertify the 100,000 households in those counties in the amount of time Rollins allotted, and that all Minnesota food stamp recipients are periodically recertified.
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