As poor Americans continue to be pawns in the Trump administration's gameplay over the government shutdown, California Attorney General Rob Bonta is seeking guidance from the Supreme Court over how to address the administration's latest "capricious" demand.

The saga over SNAP payments to 42 million low-income Americans continues this week, as Congress gets closer to a vote to reopen the federal government. Over the weekend, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) issued a directive telling California and other states that paid out full SNAP benefits to recipients last week that they needed to "undo" those payments, which it said were "unauthorized" based on the legal status of the administration's fight over these benefits.

"To the extent States sent full SNAP payment files for November 2025, this was unauthorized,” said Patrick Penn, deputy undersecretary of Agriculture, in a letter to state SNAP directors Sunday. "Accordingly, States must immediately undo any steps taken to issue full SNAP benefits for November 2025."

As the Associated Press reports, the USDA further threatened penalties for any states that do not comply.

As NBC Bay Area reports, AG Rob Bonta and other attorneys general are now seeking clarity from the Supreme Court over the issue, just as the Trump administration is appealing a decision from a lower court in Rhode Island that said full benefits must be paid — a decision upheld by an appeals court in Boston early Monday.

"Between Nov. 3 and Nov. 8, USDA issued formal guidance four distinct times, each providing our states with new directives that were contrary to its earlier guidance," Bonta said in a statement. "Those contradictory messages underscore that USDA’s actions have been arbitrary, they've been capricious and demonstrates why we need the court to step in to provide clarity and concrete guidance."

On Friday, Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson issued an emergency stay, as a procedural matter, allowing the Trump administration to continue pausing SNAP benefits as it appealed the lower court's ruling on the matter. That stay remains in place until Wednesday morning — 48 hours after the appellate court in Boston also ruled against the administration.

The administration indicated Monday it would seek an order from the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court now could issue its own directive in the next two days, finally settling the issue, or let the lower court's ruling stand as the appellate court did.

Many critics on the left see the administration's antics as both gamesmanship, in an effort to turn poor Americans against Democrats for instigating the shutdown, and as a rehearsal for major cuts to the SNAP program that Republicans have pushed for for decades.

Federal judges in both Boston and Rhode Island ruled last week that the administration should tap emergency funds in order to cover SNAP benefits for November, with the Rhode Island judge ruling Thursday that full, not partial, benefits must be paid. The administration had previously said it would comply with the Boston judge's order and pay out partial benefits for the month.

In his ruling, Rhode Island-based US District Judge John McConnell said, "The evidence shows that people will go hungry, food pantries will be overburdened, and needless suffering will occur [if SNAP benefits are withheld]. That's what irreparable harm here means."

Following that ruling, California and other states immediately began sending out SNAP benefits on Friday.

Alaska used its own state funds to help backfill the program and pay out SNAP benefits, and its Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski, tells the AP, "It’s one thing if the federal government is going to continue its level of appeal through the courts to say, no, this can’t be done. But when you are telling the states that have said this is a significant enough issue in our state, we’re going to find resources, backfill or front load, whatever term you want, to help our people, those states should not be penalized."

Previously: Trump Administration Agrees to Fund 50% of SNAP Benefits For November

Photo via Getty Images

Californians who use food assistance benefits received an extra boost of at least $95 in their monthly CalFresh payments during the pandemic. Now, the federal government has terminated that additional help, leaving close to 100,000 San Franciscans in the lurch.

Axios Local reported that an estimated 96,000 SF residents across 70,000 households — representing 12% of the city’s population — will collectively lose access to an extra $11.5 million in assistance a month.

The federal food assistance program known as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), called CalFresh in California, gave San Franciscans an extra payment ranging from $95 and $517 per month, according to Axios. The exact amount is determined by income and household size, after those who meet federal income eligibility rules sign up for the monthly benefits.

SNAP received an infusion of funding when the pandemic began in 2020 to help fight food insecurity for Americans facing furloughs, layoffs, and economic hardship. Since then, the number of San Francisco residents receiving CalFresh assistance has increased by about 51% (from January 2020 to December 2022), according to the SF Human Services Agency.

But Congress voted to end these extra benefits as part of the federal omnibus spending plan. The extra benefits were officially terminated in February, although the last remaining funds will be distributed throughout March. Additionally, California’s COVID-19 State of Emergency ended on February 28.

Do you use #CalFresh (food stamps)?

Your last extra COVID food money will be deposited in March.

We know this may be a stressful time and we’re here to help. Give us a call at (415) 557-5000 with any questions about CalFresh or visit https://t.co/v355EWNeYT pic.twitter.com/r0SiN32Qbe

— San Francisco Human Services Agency (@SFHumanServices) March 1, 2023

A reported 3 million Californians will lose access to the benefits that helped them not go hungry, at a time when inflation and cost-of-living expenses are skyrocketing, according to the L.A. Times. That includes approximately 96,000 San Franciscans, according to Axios, and roughly 256,000 more households across Santa Clara, San Mateo, Alameda and Contra Costa counties, according to the Mercury Times.

San Franciscans using CalFresh benefits will see an average cut of about $160 from their monthly payments, according to the Chronicle. Some households might receive only the $23 monthly base allotment — a number calculated based on the federal cost of living, not even adjusted for the Bay Area’s high cost of living,

Local food banks that could provide extra help for those in need are also already strained from high costs. Food prices alone have rose 9.9% in 2022, according to the USDA. The San Francisco-Marin Food Bank said in January that it and other food banks in the area are "stretched to the limit by inflation, shrinking government support, and declining donations."

One CalFresh recipient, Patricia Carr, a 73-year-old San Francisco resident with diabetes, told Mission Local columnist Joe Eskenazi that she was knew that the end of the extra assistance meant “a lot less” money.

Thousands of San Franciscans will soon have their food benefits sharply reduced — *to $23 a month.*

100,000 San Franciscans are affected, and the average loss per household is $160 a month. https://t.co/GopvkMpj6X pic.twitter.com/xILvb9FHiq

— Joe Eskenazi (@EskSF) February 9, 2023

"I do need it,” she said in an interview. “But God bless the USA they gave it to us at all."

Experts told the Mercury News that the end of enhanced SNAP could mean that a few hundred thousand Californians could sink back below the poverty level. Caroline Danielson, a senior fellow at the Public Policy Institute of California, told the Mercury News that in the institute’s work, “we showed that CalFresh had twice the impact in 2021 as it did in 2019 in reducing poverty.”

“Some of that benefit will go away, and it won’t have quite the same poverty effect that it did in 2021,” Danielson said.

Research found that the extra SNAP benefits helped to keep 4.2 million people above the poverty line in the final quarter of 2021, resulting in reductions in overall poverty by 10% and child poverty by 14%, according to the economic think tank, the Urban Institute. These benefits particularly helped cut poverty rates most steeply among Black and Latino recipients.

More relief could be available from this year's farm bill, which authorizes SNAP, but Congress’ infighting might mean that these important federal nutritional programs don’t pass, Axios reported. However, some state laws could step up to address food affordability and insecurity for Californians, and a handful of food-related bills are currently working their way through Sacramento.

Related: Today, SFist Is Retiring Its COVID Data Update Page

The pandemic pushed local food banks to the brim as they dealt with record numbers of requests. COVID-19 has also stretched the Bay Area's growing food access crisis, leaving a large amount of the region's population more than a half-mile away from the nearest grocery store.

Food deserts — areas that have below-average access to food, which can cause residents of those regions to travel miles to find the nearest grocery outlet — are on the rise. Pharmacy deserts, too, are increasing month after month; the recent shuttering of five San Francisco Walgreens stores has only worsened that problem in the city.

But a recent analysis conducted by ABC7 has shed a light on just how severe (and how dangerous) the crisis of food access has gotten in the Bay Area.

According to the data collected by the news outlet, at least 889 neighborhoods in the Bay Area are considered to have "low food access." Of those urban areas, 600 are found in the San Francisco metro area, while another 289 food deserts exist around San Jose; a quick glance at the map also reveals nearly all the neighborhoods that make up the cities of Pittsburg and Antioch exist within food deserts.

It's estimated that over one million Californians now live within food deserts. Compounding the issue further: 45% of all residents in the state who live in food deserts are considered low-income individuals, per a report by California FreshWorks. Locally, ABC7's data analysis found some 250 low-income neighborhoods in the Bay Area also have low food access — in some cases making up over 20% of a county's neighborhoods, as is the case with Santa Clara County.

Inflation of the U.S dollar, as well, is to also blame for worsening food scarcity and affordability across the country, including here in the Bay Area.

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2021 has seen the national averages for meats, poultry, fish, and eggs increase 10.5%. As measured by the Consumer Price Index (CPI), the annual rate of inflation from October 2020 to October 2021 was 6.2% — three times the annual average. It's little wonder why the maximum monthly CalFresh food stamp allotment of $194 for a single-person household doesn’t go all too far these days.

And when you consider that the average low-income household spends some 40% of their gross income on food, it's a trend that can only lead to increased rates of Bay Area hunger until some resolution is found.

To find other food access sites provided by the SF-Marin Food Bank, as well as their schedules of operation, visit sfmfoodbank.org/find-food; to learn about how you can either donate acceptable food or volunteer your time, visit here and here, respectively.

Related: Local Food Bank Opens First Drive-Through Pantry in SF; No Reservations Needed To Collect Sustenance

New Nonprofit Delivers Fresh Produce to SF Seniors — Including Retired Nurse Who Remembers AIDS Epidemic

Low-Income Seniors at Mission SRO Go Hungry After Food Pantry Stops Delivering

Top Photo: Courtesy of Twitter via @SFMFoodBank

The Giants parking lot at Oracle Park — Seawall Lot 337 — was transformed into a drive-through food pantry yesterday afternoon by the San Francisco-Marin Food Bank, a first of its kind for the city.

As unemployment rates continue to climb, both in our metro and around the country, hunger is swelling into a more deleterious issue. Even pre-pandemic, it’s estimated some 870,000 people in the Bay Area, roughly the population of San Francisco, are food-insecure. The Francisco-Marin Food Bank has been on a three-plus-decades long mission to feed the masses, with the city's first-ever drive-through, contact-free food pantry — which officially opened yesterday in China Basin — being their most timely effort.

As reported by the SF Examiner, the food bank's drive-through model was greenlit by the Port Commission just days before its initial run. Yesterday, 60 volunteers helped streamline the novel, socially distant endeavor as cars cued up in nine lanes to wait for boxes of food — 25 lbs heavy, filled with nonperishables, like canned lentils and peanut butter, and fresh produce — to be placed in their trunks.

“We have no idea what our new normal will be,” Katy McKnight, San Francisco-Marin Food Bank’s director of community engagement, told the SF Examiner's Josua Sabitini Friday.

One "new normal" for the food pantry seems to be an increase in the number of households they’re serving. Before the COVID-19, the San Francisco-Marin Food Bank assisted around 32,000 households through their network of food pantries. That number has grown substantially — almost doubling, in fact.

“Right now, we are serving nearly double the number of households that we were serving before the pandemic," McKnight adds. "It’s hard to say what that recovery is going to look like and how quickly people may not need our assistance as much.”

Currently, their goal is to serve between 300 and 1,200 families every Friday between 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the mobile food pantry. Starting next weekend, the site will also substitute as a walk-up site for food pick up, opening two hours earlier at 9 a.m. but closing at the same time.

Plans to expand the model across the Bay Area are also in motion as a means to sustain community members affected by certain pantry locations closing amid COVID-19.

“Unfortunately, due to COVID-19, more than 100 of the food pantries in our network of more than 275 pantries have had to close in recent weeks,” said Keely Hopkins, a spokesperson for the San Francisco-Marin Food Bank, to the news outlet. “To fill the gap and ensure our neighbors can still have access to healthy food, the food bank has been working hard to open interim pop-up pantries. [We will continue] to open pop-up pantries throughout San Francisco and Marin."

According to SFGate, the local food bank is operating 24 pop-up pantries in San Francisco and Marin counties; each one is believed to serve between 900 to 1,500 households — every week.

The SF Examiner, too, notes that no reservations are required and vehicles, once at the pop-up pantry's 74 Mission Rock Street address, "can line up on the southern side of Terry A Francois Boulevard" to drive through and collect their boxes.

SF-Marin Food Bank's ongoing efforts and those from other local nonprofits like TogetherSF — operated by principally still employed volunteers who continue delivering fresh produce to senior citizens and other at-risk cohorts — are becoming more important by the day.

To find other food access sites provided by the SF-Marin Food Bank, as well as their schedules of operation, visit sfmfoodbank.org/find-food; to learn about how you can either donate acceptable food or volunteer your time, visit here and here, respectively.

The drive-through pantry at 74 Mission Rock Street is expected to remain operational as long as there's a need for it and under the Port Commission’s ability to waive the location’s rent for them.

Related: New Nonprofit Delivers Fresh Produce to SF Seniors — Including Retired Nurse Who Remembers AIDS Epidemic

Low-Income Seniors at Mission SRO Go Hungry After Food Pantry Stops Delivering

Image: Unsplash via Helinton Fantin

Established in 2005, San Francisco Department of Health Food Security Task Force is "charged with the responsibility of creating a city-wide plan for addressing food security." Those goals got more specific in 2013, when the Board of Supervisors unanimously approved a resolution to end hunger and food insecurity in the city by 2020." Since then, the FSTF has soldiered on, following SF's nutrition needs and tracking efforts across city and state agencies (you can see all their recent reports here) to reach that goal.

In a hearing Wednesday at the Board of Supervisors Budget and Finance Committee, the HFST shared San Francisco's latest facts and figures on how much is being spent to ensure every SF resident has access to healthy food. For a deeper dive, check out the briefing booklet, hearing materials, and full presentation from yesterday's meeting — for now, let's just look at some of the numbers.

• 200: The number of food pantries in SF
• 100,000: The number of people those pantries serve every week
• 38: The number of SF food pantries that run out of food before everyone who visits is served
• $13.3 million: The amount of money requested for SF food-security programs in the next fiscal year
• $7.7 million: The amount of money SF spent this fiscal year "to deliver meals to 5,050 seniors and those with disabilities"
• 4,972: The number of additional seniors and disabled people who need that same meal delivery function but are currently not served
• $4 million: The annual budgetary increase requested to serve every senior/disabled adult San Franciscan who needs meal delivery
• 2,831: The number of seniors and siaabled adults who are currently served by SF's grocery delivery programs
• 7,199: The number of San Franciscans who need grocery delivery but can't get it
• $6.9 million: The amount of money it would cost to deliver groceries to all who need the service
• 108,000: The number of SF residents estimated to be eligible to receive CalFresh (food stamp) benefits
• 54,000: The number of SF residents who are actually enrolled in the program
• $227: The average amount of monthly benefits one receives while on CalFresh
• $675,000: The amount of money the FSTF is requesting for next year "to launch pilot programs at two SRO sites for such things as installation of cooking appliances, since many units in the Tenderloin lack kitchens, and to begin offering cooking classes."
• 1,000: The number of qualifying Tenderloin, SoMa and Bayview residents who get an up to $10/week voucher to spend at participating corner stores on fruits and vegetables
• $400,000: The amount of money requested to increase that program
• 1 in 4: The number of SF residents who live below 200 percent of the federal poverty line, "which for a family of three is a household income of about $40,000"
• 200,000: The estimated number of SF residents who do "not have the food they need to remain healthy"

All bulleted quotes: SF strives to eliminate hunger by 2020, SF Examiner, April 14, 2016

The San Francisco Food Bank has been bringing daily healthy morning snacks to hungry students at schools throughout San Francisco for the past three years, largely in part thanks to the generosity of the local community. Federal Express is currently matching donations to the program through Friday, April 13th (up to $30,000), so now's a great time to donate to the food bank if you've been meaning to do so.

The Morning Snack Program launched in collaboration with The Food Pantry in three schools in January of 2009 and has grown to accommodate 32 public schools and day care centers where over 50% of the students qualify to receive free or reduced-price meals.

The program provides snacks such as fresh oranges, bananas, apples, whole grain products, low-fat, nutrient-dense granola bars, nut butters, low-fat cheese, and milk five days a week to hungry students, and teachers have seen successful results. The Food Bank describes the experience of teacher Chris Telles from Daniel Webster Elementary School in Potrero Hill:

Prior to the Morning Snack Program, Mr. Chris’ students had difficulty in the hours before lunchtime. “It was hard for them to concentrate. They would keep asking, ‘Mr. Chris, when are we going to eat lunch?’ I don’t get those questions anymore.”

Hello there. It's me, Brock Keeling, editor of SFist. I'm coming at you in the first-person since I will starve to death (presumably) next week when I take and then report on the San Francisco Food Bank's Hunger Challenge. See, more than 237,000 residents in San Francisco and Marin struggle to put food on the table for themselves and their families. With the aid of Electronic Benefit Transfer cards (AKA "food stamps"), these people, most of whom who are just like you or me, spend an average of $4.72 per day ($33.04 a week) for edible nourishment. That's it. That's all. And while it's better than nothing, it's not much.

From September 11th to 16th, I plan on spending a scant $4.72 per day on food and beverages. That amount will go toward my three (or eight) meals a day, booze, and most terrifyingly of all, my coffee intake. (I spend well over $8 per day on caffeine, which pales in comparison to an unseemly daily dairy budget.) After the challenge ends, I will report on my experience on SFist... provided I haven't hurled my laptop out a third-story window.

I won't even allow myself to hit up any choice open-bar parties or catered galas. Can you imagine? It's like I'm Jesus.

Anyway, the Hunger Challenge's goal is to help folks walk in someone else's shoes for one week. As SF Food Bank notes, "And when you talk to family and friends and share your experiences with others, you'll help them understand why it's important for all of us to help support the families who can't feed themselves on a food stamp budget alone."

If you would like to take the challenge yourself, please visit their site for further details. For more information on the EBT Project or how you can sign up, go here.

After UCB Chancellor Robert Birgeneau agreed to a meeting with representatives, Cal students called off their 10-day hunger strike last night. The Daily Californian, "The strike, which began May 3 as a demonstration focused on a controversial Arizona immigration law and has attracted attention worldwide, concluded as all but one of the 18 strikers ate ears of corn together in a symbolic gesture." Whatever the hell that means.

Although Birgeneau met with the starving students, he couldn't meet all of their demand, which included making the UC Berkeley campus a sanctuary campus for workers and students, clearing all charges against the students involved in the Wheeler Hall slumber party, and re-hiring laid-off workers.

However, according to BCN (via CBS 5), UC Berkeley did agree to "[expanding] a task force that looks at issues surrounding undocumented students and workers ... and will continue to work with labor management to address concerns regarding layoffs."

Before you shove another maple bacon donut down your richly-textured gullet, remember: people are still starving in America. Even in San Francisco. (Look for further than Civic Center on a Monday night to see hordes of hungry homeless folks lined up to eat digestible, yet bacon-free, stew.) Fortunately, Traci Des Jardins is hosting Taste of the Nation (Share Our Strength) on Thursday at AT&T Park to help out.

The evening of choice bites and booze will feature noted chefs and bartenders, including Dominique Crenn of Luce, Jen Biesty of Scala’s Bistro, Mark Sullivan of Spruce, Matthew Accarrino of SPQR, Hoss Zare of Zare at Fly Trap, Elizabeth Falkner of Citizen Cake/Orson, and more. And, of course, the flavors of Traci des Jardins of Jardiniere, Manzanita, Mijita, and Public House will be available.

100% of the proceeds will go to Taste of the Nation. For tickets and more information, please go here.

What: Taste of the Nation
When: Thursday, 4/29
Where: AT&T Park (Club Level, of course)
Tickets: VIP Admission (5:30 to 9:30 p.m.): $140; general admission (6:30 to 9:30 p.m.): $85

So, the Old Gray Lady hauled out the printing press to publish a story about how "cool-hunting hipsters" love Valenica Street. Sure, it's a dated piece. Wildly so, it seems. The article goes on and on Valencia Street faves: terrorist hangout Ritual Coffee Roasters, the macabre plant/carcass retailer Paxton Gate, and the God-we-love-this-place-so-much-but-wish-half-of-you-who-go-there-would-head-to-Casanova-instead Amnesia.

But the Times article also mentions new-ish restaurant Spork, sits in the same building as the old KFC. Whimsically, the restaurant nods at the implements used by its former occupant, while only serving food that is financially out of reach for its former customers. Which? Makes us feel squeamish inside. Right or wrong, it just does. ("Spork turns out slow-food favorites like grass-fed beef burger ($14), Kona Kampachi sashimi ($13) and mussels and slow-roasted pork ($18)," NYT breathlessly reports.)

While the adoption of "comfort foods" is a pleasant (albeit increasingly twee) trend, and a nice break from more dining, when does that line go from nostalgic to camp to mockery of not just the food, but of the class that consumes it?