McConnell has requested an update from the administration on SNAP funding by 12 PM ET on Monday.
NBC News has reached out to the White House, the Office of Management and Budget and the USDA for comment.
President Donald Trump said on social media “Government lawyers believe we do not have the legal authority to pay SNAP with the specific funds available to us,” he said Friday, “and two courts have now issued conflicting opinions on what we can and cannot do.”
“I have instructed my lawyers to ask the court to clarify how SNAP can be legally funded as soon as possible,” Trump said.
National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett criticized the ruling in an interview with Meet the Press Now on Friday afternoon.
“I don’t think the liberal judges are right about this,” Hassett said.
“Our legal analysis is that emergency funds should be used for emergencies,” he said. “But if you think about it, it seems like we’re in a situation where a Democratic judge is willing to say it’s a state of emergency because the Democrats are not going to open the government.”
Democracy Forward, a progressive legal advocacy group representing the plaintiffs, applauded the ruling.
“Today’s decision affirms what the law and basic decency demand: The Trump-Vance administration must use its power to support, not harm, the American people,” Skye Perryman, president and CEO of Democracy Forward, said in a statement.
Perryman’s group represented a class of plaintiffs in the Rhode Island lawsuit, including municipalities, charitable and faith-based nonprofits, businesses, and union groups.
Perryman said in a statement that their group was “honored to represent a coalition that has refused to accept starvation as a cruel tactic of political pressure,” adding, “We will continue to fight to ensure that our institutions serve our people with integrity, compassion, and accountability.”
In a separate ruling, a federal judge in Boston said Friday that he wanted additional briefings before deciding whether the Agriculture Department should use emergency funds to continue SNAP benefits for millions of Americans after Democratic leaders sued the agency.
““Plaintiffs have standing to bring this lawsuit and will likely succeed in their argument that Defendants’ suspension of SNAP benefits was unlawful,” Judge Indira Talwani wrote in the decision.
“If the benefit suspension is based on a misinterpretation of the relevant statute, the Court will allow Defendants to consider whether to grant reduced SNAP benefits at least in November and report back to the Court no later than Monday, November 3, 2025,” she wrote.
Talwani, of the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts, said Thursday that the government cannot simply cut off benefits because it cannot afford the program.
Talwani said he would like to hear back from the administration no later than Monday, November 3, 2025.
On Tuesday, the attorneys general of 22 states and the District of Columbia, as well as the governors of Kansas, Kentucky and Pennsylvania, sued the U.S. Department of Agriculture, arguing that they are legally required to continue providing SNAP benefits during the government shutdown as long as the agency funds them. They asked a judge to force the agency to use emergency funds appropriated by Congress.
The lawsuit seeks a temporary restraining order requiring the agency to provide SNAP benefits in the state through November.
The USDA said: message As expected, they posted on their website that benefits would not be credited to EBT cards on November 1st. Up to 42 million Americans rely on this program.
Earlier Thursday, before the rulings in Rhode Island and Massachusetts, Trump criticized SNAP funding shortfalls, saying Senate Democrats could vote to end the ongoing federal government shutdown if they wanted to fund SNAP.
“All the Democrats have to do is say, ‘Let’s go.’ I mean, they don’t have to do anything. All they have to do is say, ‘Government is open.’” The president spoke to reporters aboard Air Force One en route to Florida.
