Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell is unsatisfied with President Donald Trump administration’s decision to fund partial payments to SNAP recipients in November as the government shutdown drags on.
The payouts come after two federal judges ruled that freezing payments for the nutrition assistance program were unlawful. Campbell co-led a group of 26 states who sued the United States Department of Agriculture and its Secretary Brooke Rollins for suspending benefits on Nov. 1 because of the government shutdown.
The USDA is tapping into a contingency fund that will only cover about half of the $8 billion a month in national food assistance payments, a move that Campbell called “problematic.”
“They could tap into billions to fully fund every single person, all 42 million Americans in the country, including 1.1 million folks here in Massachusetts,” Campbell told Boston Public Radio on Tuesday.
Massachusetts receives about $240 million a month from the federal government to fund SNAP here.
The courts said the USDA must use the more than $5 billion in contingency funds approved by Congress for this type of situation. A judge in Boston also said the administration could choose to use customs revenues, too, which are available through the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1935, but the administration has refused.
Campbell said refusing to tap into all available funds is an “intentional policy choice by the president.”
The Trump administration said there could be delays in disbursing the payments this month. Campbell said Massachusetts residents could expect to see relief in about a week. She said going back to court to push the administration to fund the remainder is “not off the table,” but that would cause additional delays.
“People need this money yesterday,” Campbell said.
Campbell was also asked whether she’d support banning law enforcement agents from wearing masks while on duty. A bill filed in the Massachusetts Senate would do just that.
Campbell said this legislation would be more effective at the federal level because it’s ICE agents who have been using this tactic during immigration operations in the state.
“Our authority and holding ICE officials accountable is much more challenging than holding, say, our state police or local municipal leaders accountable, or local law enforcement,” she said.
During her interview with Boston Public Radio, the attorney general also addressed whether ballot question 1, which would allow State Auditor Diana DiZoglio to audit the legislature, will ever be enforced. It’s been one year since voters passed it into law.
Campbell said she agrees with the law and voted in support of it. Her office has asked DiZoglio for specifics on what they want to audit because the state constitution limits what the auditor can actually do. Campbell said DiZoglio has not provided that, while the auditor says they have.
“This is what sucks,” Campbell said, “At no point in our analysis to approve a ballot question that goes to our incredible voters, is it determined if it’s constitutional or not, which is ridiculous. You would want it to do that at the beginning, not at the end. Our process doesn’t even allow for it. So then we get into this hiccup.”
That process may be worth evaluating, she added.
