Under the Trump administration, millions of people have come off food stamps and are now returning to work. U.S. Navy file photo.
Trump managed to get more than 5 million people off food stamps, and that’s a good thing. Democrats are angry because they want free money to keep flowing.
Enrollment in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), commonly known as food stamps, fell from 42.2 million people in May 2025 to 36.6 million in May 2026, a decline of more than 13 percent. President Trump signed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which expanded SNAP work requirements, in July 2025.
Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins called the decline a victory. Speaking at Minnesota Farmfest in August, she told the audience that moving 5 million people off food stamps was “a pretty big win.”
Rollins attributed the decline to a stronger economy and the removal of people she said should not have been receiving benefits.
The decline in SNAP enrollment has coincided with private-sector job growth. In October 2026, employers added 165,000 jobs, 159,000 of them in the private sector, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Unemployment fell from 4.4 percent in September 2025 to 4.1 percent in October 2026.
The administration has also pursued fraud in the program. Rollins told the House Agriculture Committee that USDA has made more than 900 arrests in connection with SNAP.
Democrats have described the changes as taking food from the most vulnerable Americans. In October 2025, Rep. Angie Craig of Minnesota, the ranking Democrat on the House Agriculture Committee, said that “withholding food from hungry children, seniors, people with disabilities and veterans is a choice.”
At a committee hearing, Craig told Rollins, “Over the last year, I’ve watched you brag about taking food away from millions of Americans… Honestly, it’s disgusting.”
Recipients ages 18 to 64 who have no exemption must work, volunteer or take part in job training for at least 80 hours a month. Those who fall short are limited to three months of benefits in a three-year period. The law raised the upper age for the requirement from 54 to 64 and extended it to parents whose youngest child is 14 to 17. It also ended exemptions for homeless individuals, veterans, and former foster youth ages 24 and younger.
Under the enacted statute, the work requirement exempts people under 18 or 65 and older, people medically certified as physically or mentally unfit for employment, pregnant women, and parents or other household members responsible for a child under 14. Children in a SNAP household remain eligible even if an adult in that household loses benefits for failing to meet the requirement.
Child enrollment also fell. A ProPublica analysis of 12 states that report SNAP participation by age found that child enrollment fell by 776,134 as overall enrollment fell by 1,670,011, according to a summary by CSPI. Rollins disputed the reported drop in child enrollment, saying, “The 700,000 number of children is not correct.”
The law also shifts a share of SNAP benefit costs to states with higher payment error rates. Beginning in October 2027, states subject to the cost-sharing requirement will have to pay between 5 and 15 percent of SNAP benefit costs, depending on their payment error rates.
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