© Rod Lamkey, Jr., Associated Press | In the week since federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits nearly expired, the Trump administration has successfully pushed back on orders from federal courts to maintain payments for November, a back-and-forth that has thrown U.S. food assistance into chaos.
The federal government funds SNAP, while states handle the administrative task of distributing payments to qualifying residents. Conflicting messaging on how much money will be available and when states can expect it has left the 42 million Americans who rely on SNAP in limbo.
States and food banks have had to watch for and react to every court order and response this week as they contend with the unprecedented lapse in crucial food assistance. |
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Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson temporarily halted an order requiring the Trump administration make full Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP) November payments by Friday.
Jackson's ruling pauses some of the payments until the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit can decide the administration's motion to block the order pending its appeal.
It does not reflect a ruling on the underlying legal merits of the case, but it provides a temporary reprieve to the Trump administration, which went to the Supreme Court earlier Friday evening. |
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BY AL WEAVER AND ALEXANDER BOLTON |
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) and his Republican leadership team are scrambling for new ideas to end the 38-day government shutdown after it became clear Friday that tactics to pressure Democrats to vote for a House-passed funding bill have failed so far.
Senate Republicans are batting around various ideas to break the stalemate, such as voting on a new Senate-drafted bill that would fund a large swath of the federal government through fiscal year 2026.
This approach, championed by members of the Appropriations Committee, would entail voting on three regular appropriations bills that passed the Senate earlier this year with strong bipartisan support and which have been vetted with House Republicans. |
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Rep. Tim Burchett (R-Tenn.) on Friday said the government shutdown, the longest in modern U.S. history, will stretch past Thanksgiving.
"I think it's going to go on after Thanksgiving," Burchett told anchor Black Burman on "The Hill on NewsNation." "Yeah, I think the pain is going to continue until the TSA — [if] you have three or four Democrats peel off and capitulate on this thing, and it's going to come back and say, 'Hey, you know this is our health care issue. Let's come to the table. Let's quit suffering. Let's get to the table on this, on this health care issue.'" "And until that happens, I don't see it happening," Burchett added.
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As the Trump administration slashes and transforms the National Institutes of Health (NIH), minority health researchers are walking a tightrope, trying to maintain funding without crossing the vague line into "diversity, equity and inclusion" (DEI) projects.
Researchers told The Hill they are facing unclear research directives, increasingly competitive grant awards and politicized peer review processes as they battle to sustain their work improving health outcomes for minority populations.
"The rules are being changed all the time. The communication is not clear. Study sections [are] getting paused," said Samira Asgari, a tenure-track assistant professor at the Institute for Genomic Health at Oakland School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. "This brings just an environment of lack of stability and uncertainty." |
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States are racing to win their slice of a new $50 billion rural health fund amid worries the program's lack of guardrails and rushed timeline could mean the providers who need the most help will get squeezed out by larger, politically connected health systems.
The One Big Beautiful Bill Act created the fund as a backstop for states that are set to lose nearly $1 trillion in Medicaid funding over the next decade.
"I think everyone would agree that the money is not nearly enough to fill the hole caused by the cuts in H.R. 1. But of course, states are still excited to apply for federal funding when there's any available, at the time when resources are constrained," said Heather Howard, a Princeton University professor and a former New Jersey health official who has been tracking state applications. |
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A federal judge on Friday ruled President Trump unlawfully called up and planned to deploy Oregon's National Guard to Portland, the most decisive blow yet to his bid to send troops into Democratic-led cities where protests have centered on federal immigration facilities.
U.S. District Judge Karin Immergut, a Trump appointee, permanently blocked the president from sending Oregon's soldiers into the city after determining that the president ran afoul of federal law and stepped on the state's sovereignty in his bid to send the troops into Portland streets. |
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BY ELLEN MITCHELL AND FILIP TIMOTIJA |
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Friday unveiled a sweeping overhaul to how the Pentagon buys weapons, a restructuring aimed at having the U.S. military more quickly acquire new technology.
Addressing industry leaders and military officials at the National War College in Washington, D.C., Hegseth detailed his vision for the Defense Acquisition System, which he said is now renamed to the "Warfighting Acquisitions System." |
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President Trump said on Friday that the United States will not be part of the upcoming Group of 20 (G20) summit in South Africa, calling it "a total disgrace."
"Afrikaners (People who are descended from Dutch settlers, and also French and German immigrants) are being killed and slaughtered, and their land and farms are being illegally confiscated," Trump said in a Truth Social post. "No U.S. Government Official will attend as long as these Human Rights abuses continue," the post also reads. "I look forward to hosting the 2026 G20 in Miami, Florida!" |
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OPINION | For more than three years, Russian President Vladimir Putin has used nuclear threats as his go-to weapon against Western support for Ukraine. Battlefield setbacks? Cue the warnings about "red lines" and World War III.
And it worked. The Biden administration's careful, incremental approach to military aid was partly shaped by fear of crossing Putin's threshold. But things have changed. Putin's nuclear theater has not just failed to intimidate President Trump — it has backfired so badly that the Kremlin had to scramble and walk back its own threats. In fact, this may be the moment Putin's nuclear blackmail finally hit its expiration date. |
OPINION | The ongoing government shutdown is having a big impact on small businesses like mine. It's past time for politicians to stop their grandstanding and restart government operations and the nation's small business engine.
I own numerous hotels on the East Coast that employ hundreds of people. But since the shutdown started over a month ago, revenue at my Washington-area locations is down about 30 percent. That's a massive hit in an industry that runs on notoriously slim profit margins. The shutdown means no government conferences, no agency trainings, and far fewer lobbyists booking rooms or events. Tourism is down as federal sites are closed. Normally, this time of year is filled with business travelers and agency meetings tied to the federal calendar. Now, we have vacant rooms, night after night. |
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With little public scrutiny, the Trump administration is handing out hundreds of billions of dollars in tax cuts to some of the country's most profitable companies and wealthiest investors.
The Treasury Department and Internal Revenue Service, through a series of new notices and proposed regulations, are giving breaks to giant private equity firms, crypto companies, foreign real estate investors, insurance providers and a variety of multinational corporations. |
BY LINDSAY WISE, CAMERON MCWHIRTER |
Senate Republicans need a handful of Democrats to vote with them to reopen the government. And they have been eyeing Georgia's Jon Ossoff as one of the most likely to crack.
Ossoff is the only Democratic senator up for reelection next year in a state President Trump won. But so far, he has shown little sign of buckling.
Pursued by reporters in the hallways of the Capitol, Ossoff says his constituents want him both to reopen the government and address expiring healthcare subsidies. He sharply criticizes Trump, saying the president needs to step in and make a deal. And he sticks tightly to that script, giving virtually the same answers every day no matter what the shutdown-related questions might be. |
The vivid blue campaign signs with bold orange lettering were impossible to miss as Zohran Mamdani made his historic and improbable run for New York City mayor this summer.
On storefront windows and telephone poles from Queens to the Bronx, the "Zohran for New York City" signs stood out from the standard red, white and blue campaign fodder. The lettering was seen by many as an intentional reference to old-school Bollywood posters — a subtle nod to Mamdani's Indian heritage. |
In Pennsylvania's Bucks County, voters elected a Democratic district attorney for the first time since the 1800s, part of a Democratic sweep of every county office including controller and recorder of deeds.
In Georgia, Democrats ousted two Republicans on the Public Service Commission, the party's first capture of a statewide office in Georgia since 2006. In Connecticut, Democrats took control of 28 individual towns from the GOP. In New Jersey, Democrats won their biggest majority in the General Assembly since the Watergate era. |
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