Tonight I checked my EBT application on my smartphone, and found that my account had its usual starting balance for the month of $122.00. But the continuing federal government shutdown had delayed that payment to me, as well as millions of others across the nation as needy or needier than I. And I’m still exercising financial caution as the shutdown continues, a privilege which I can afford.
What was my focus a few days ago, when EBT benefits were still suspended despite lower federal courts and their orders that the SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) must be funded from emergency funds? It was on a large container of a product called Orgain that a dietitian had recommended to me early this year, and is covered by SNAP (unlike many supplements such as vitamins): how nice that that container from last month was mostly full! It’s a very healthy vegan protein supplement, which helped with my underweight problem at the beginning of this year, and got me to an acceptable weight. I said to myself, “Well, I have plenty for this month.” The containers cost about $50.00 each, and it was nice not to worry about my Orgain supply as I worried about the state of our democracy.
What does the availability of my EBT benefits now mean for me? Concretely, it means that my In-Home Supportive Services (IHSS) caregiver and I can use the EBT benefits at a local farmers’ market to get vegetables for an unsalted soup that my caregiver makes for me. It’s getting harder to find unsalted vegan soup commercially, but my caregiver is very gifted at making me a customized substitute; next time they may try adding tomatoes as an extra seasoning, although their soup was delicious without this special treat. It’s a chunky vegetable soup.
My caregiver also knows my weaknesses for rice cakes and corn cakes and pumpkin seed granola; EBT spells a bit of security for me as a senior with disabilities in getting a healthy diet.
Of course, EBT is also a lifeline for others in more desperate need: I am fortunate to have a roof over my head, a Housing Choice Voucher (also known as Section 8), and Supplemental Security Income (SSI), not to mention IHSS as part of Medi-Cal (California’s implementation of Medicaid). Thus I was well prepared to wait out a few days of uncertainty before a lawsuit filed by my Governor, Gavin Newsom, along with three other states’ governors, and 23 state attorney generals (including California’s Rob Bonta) led to a release of funds.
As I write, the litigation is still ongoing, with SCOTUS (Supreme Court of the United States) Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson as circuit justice temporarily granting a 48-hour administrative stay on a First Circuit ruling that the Trump Administration must make full payment of SNAP benefits for November. Legal analysts explained that Justice Jackson was actually acting to minimize delay; by setting the stay at only 48 hours after the First Circuit rules on a similar request for an administrative stay, she prevented a majority of her colleagues from possibly granting a longer stay and signalled the First Circuit that it needs to rule promptly on the Administration’s request for a stay.
But the State of California acted speedily to collect the SNAP funds needed for full benefits this month, as reflected by my account balance.
Today I felt a strange compassion for a politician ready and willing to mislead the voters against their best interests. Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-La) invited federal workers denied pay during the shutdown, as well as SNAP recipients, to find a “home” in the Republican Party which seeks to protect their benefits. He didn’t mention the Big Ugly Bill that attacked and cut those benefits, nor the attack on healthcare that led to the shutdown. Representative Johnson, when you join the war on poverty rather than on the poor, you will be walking your talk, and I’m confident that you will find a place at the table of moral fusion and justice, as did the Republican Party in the Fusionist movement of North Carolina in the 1890’s for racial equality and the regulation of corporate wealth (typified then especially by the railroads) for the public good.
Please let me conclude by saying that if you hear me, please hear out the most impacted, the unhoused and those who are not receiving adequate medical care as well as nutrition. The election this month, and the stunning success of California Proposition 50 to defend democracy nationwide, remind us that a public engaged cannot be defeated.
Margo Schulter is a senior with disabilities and a social activist who lives in Indigenous Nisenan territory, also Sacramento, California, near California State University, Sacramento, She supports the Poor People's Campaign.
