LOUISVILLE, Kentucky: People across the country formed long lines for free meals and groceries at food pantries and drive-through giveaways Saturday, after monthly benefits through the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, were suddenly cut off because of the ongoing government shutdown.
In the New York borough of the Bronx, about 200 more people than usual showed up at the World of Life Christian Fellowship International pantry, many bundled in winter hats and coats and pushing collapsible shopping carts as they waited in a line that spanned multiple city blocks. Some arrived as early as 4 a.m. to choose from pallets of fruits, vegetables, bread, milk, juice, dry goods and prepared sandwiches.
Mary Martin, who volunteers at the pantry, also relies on it regularly for food to supplement her SNAP payments. She said she usually splits her roughly $200 a month in SNAP benefits between herself and her two adult sons, one of whom has six children and is especially dependent on the assistance.
“If I didn’t have the pantry to come to, I don’t know how we would make it,” Martin said.
“I’m not gonna see my grandkids suffer.”
The Department of Agriculture planned to withhold payments to the food program starting Saturday until two federal judges ordered the administration to make them. However it was unclear as to when the debit cards that beneficiaries use could be reloaded after the ruling, sparking fear and confusion among many recipients.
In an apparent response to President Donald Trump, who said he would provide the money but wanted more legal direction from the court, US District Judge John J. McConnell in Rhode Island ordered the government to report back by Monday on how it would fund SNAP accounts.
McConnell, who was nominated by President Barack Obama, said the Trump administration must either make a full payment by that day or, if it decides to tap $3 billion in a contingency fund, figure out how to do that by Wednesday.
The delay in SNAP payments, a major piece of the nation’s social safety net that serves about 42 million people, has highlighted the financial vulnerabilities that many face. At the Bronx food pantry, the Rev. John Udo-Okon said “people from all walks of life” are seeking help now.
“The pantry is no longer for the poor, for the elderly, for the needy. The pantry now is for the whole community, everybody,” Udo-Okon said. “You see people will drive in their car and come and park and wait to see if they can get food.”
In Austell, Georgia, people in hundreds of cars in drive-through lanes picked up nonperishable and perishable bags of food. Must Ministries said it handed out food to about 1,000 people, more than a typical bimonthly food delivery.
Families in line said they worried about not getting SNAP benefits in time for Thanksgiving.
At a drive-through food giveaway at the Calvary Baptist Church in Louisville, Kentucky, SNAP recipient James Jackson, 74, said he is frustrated that people are being hurt by decisions made in Washington and lawmakers should try harder to understand challenges brought by poverty and food insecurity.
“If you’ve never been poor, you don’t know what it is to be poor,” Jackson said. “I hope that it turns around. I hope that people get their SNAP benefits, and I hope we just come together where we can love each other and feed each other and help each other.”
While there is typically a long line for Calvary Baptist Church’s drive-through events, the Rev. Samuel L. Whitlow said, the walk-in food pantry has seen increased demand recently with roughly 60 additional people showing up this week.
And in Norwich, Connecticut, the St. Vincent De Paul soup kitchen and food pantry had 10 extra volunteers working Saturday to help a wave of expected newcomers, making sure they felt comfortable and understood the services available. Besides groceries and hot meals, the site was providing pet food, toiletries and blood pressure checks.
“They’re embarrassed. They have shame. So you have to deal with that as well,” director Jill Corbin said. “But we do our best to just try to welcome people.”
___
Haigh reported from Norwich, Connecticut. Associated Press photographer Mike Stewart in Austell, Georgia, contributed.
US Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits cut off during shutdown, driving long lines at food pantries
https://arab.news/ze476
US Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits cut off during shutdown, driving long lines at food pantries
US envoys juggle two crisis talks, raising questions about prospects for success
- “Trump seems more focused on quantity over quality instead of the difficult detailed work of diplomacy,” said Bruen
- A regional official close to Iran’s leadership said the US team’s double agenda in Geneva reinforced doubts
WASHINGTON/GENEVA/DUBAI: Even for a US president long fixated on deal-making, Donald Trump’s assignment of his favorite envoys to juggle two sets of negotiations – the Iranian nuclear standoff and Russia’s war in Ukraine — in a single day in Geneva has left many in the foreign policy world scratching their heads.
The shuttle diplomacy on Tuesday by US special envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner has raised questions not only about whether they are overstretched and outmatched, but about their serious prospects for resolving either of the twin crises, experts say.
Trump, who has frequently boasted about having ended multiple wars and conflicts in the first year of his second four-year term, has made clear he is looking to add more international deals that he can tout in his quest for the Nobel Peace Prize.
But the high-stakes negotiations over the two long-running issues were arranged quickly, and the choice of Geneva as the setting for both was never clearly explained, except for the city’s long history of hosting international diplomacy.
“Trump seems more focused on quantity over quality instead of the difficult detailed work of diplomacy,” said Brett Bruen, who was a foreign policy adviser in the Obama administration and now heads the Global Situation Room strategic consultancy. “Tackling both issues at the same time in the same place doesn’t make a lot of sense.”
Iran was the opening act in a carefully choreographed diplomatic dance in Geneva, where talks took place under high security in two locations on different sides of the Swiss, French-speaking city.
After 3-1/2 hours of indirect discussions between the US team and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi mediated by Oman, both sides indicated that some progress was made, but there was no suggestion that an agreement was imminent in the longstanding dispute over Iran’s nuclear program.
As long as the diplomatic process continues, Trump can keep expanding his massive military buildup near Iran, making clear that use of force remains on the table. That is likely to keep the Middle East on edge, with many fearing that US strikes could escalate into a wider regional war.
’OVERSTRETCH’?
With barely a pause on Tuesday, the US delegates went straight from the Iran talks at Oman’s diplomatic mission to the five-star InterContinental hotel for the first of two days of Russia-Ukraine negotiations over a war that Trump, during the 2024 presidential campaign, had promised to end in a day.
Expectations were low for a breakthrough in the latest round of talks to end Europe’s biggest war since World War Two ended in 1945.
A regional official close to Iran’s leadership said the US team’s double agenda in Geneva reinforced doubts about whether Washington was sincere about either of the diplomatic efforts.
“The approach risks overstretch,” the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told Reuters. “It resembles an emergency room with two critically ill patients and a single doctor unable to give either case sustained attention, increasing the likelihood of failure.”
Mohanad Hajj-Ali of the Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut said there was too much at stake in the Iran crisis for the US to handle diplomacy this way.
“Having a team of Witkoff and Kushner tasked with resolving all the world’s problems is, frankly, a shocking reality,” he said.
Some experts said the two, both from Trump’s world of New York real estate development, lack the depth of knowledge and experience to go up against veteran negotiators like Araqchi and their Russian interlocutors and that they were in over their heads in such complicated conflicts.
Absent from the Geneva meetings was US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Trump’s top diplomat, who is known as a foreign policy wonk.
Asked for comment, White House spokesperson Anna Kelly said Trump and his team “have done more than anyone to bring both sides together to stop the killing and deliver a peace deal” in Ukraine. She denounced anonymous “critics” of the president’s approach but did not provide answers to Reuters’ specific questions for this story.
’ENVOY FOR EVERYTHING’
Administration officials have long defended Witkoff and Kushner’s roles, citing their skills as dealmakers, the trust Trump puts in them, and the failings over the years of more traditional diplomatic approaches. Witkoff, a longtime Trump friend often called the “envoy for everything” due to his broad remit, played a key role in securing a ceasefire agreement last year between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza war, though progress has stalled toward a more permanent resolution. His diplomatic efforts with Iran and Russia have had little success so far.
In Trump’s first term, Kushner spearheaded the Abraham Accords, under which several Arab states forged landmark diplomatic relations with Israel. But the pact has not advanced much since Trump returned to office nearly 13 months ago.
Kushner and Witkoff’s ability to handle their latest diplomatic tasks has been undercut by Trump’s stripping down of the government’s foreign policy apparatus, both at the State Department and the National Security Council, where many veteran staffers were sent packing, some analysts say.
”We’ve seen a hollowing-out of our diplomatic bench,” said former Obama foreign policy adviser Bruen. “So there’s a question of whether we still have the right people to work on these big issues.”
