By MAXINE BERNSTEIN/The Oregonian/OregonLive
Oregon’s governor and attorney general on Sunday denounced a federal demand that states walk back attempts to fund November food stamp benefits for needy families.
Attorney General Dan Rayfield accused President Donald Trump of “bullying hungry Americans.” Gov Tina Kotek called the move “ridiculous” and “immoral” and said “we will fight this every step of the way.”
Kotek said the president’s demands have “no impact” on the money that Oregonians received and urged people to keep using their Oregon Trail Cards as usual.
On Friday night, the Supreme Court temporarily paused the judge’s order while the Trump administration appeals. But Oregon and several other states had already approved November benefits or worked toward doing so.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture then sent a memo late Saturday night threatening to impose harsh financial penalties on states that do not comply with the government’s new orders to “undo” any work toward providing full food stamp benefits to low-income families.
“The President is abusing his office and bullying hungry Americans. Putting food on the table is not a political bargaining chip. It’s our responsibility to hold him accountable,” Rayfield said in an emailed statement responding to the memo on Sunday. “We will continue to do everything in our power to ensure that people continue to receive their SNAP benefits, and that includes the benefits that went out on Friday.”
The Agriculture Department said that states could lose access to some federal money to manage the SNAP program if they failed to undo the funding, and may be “liable” for funding full benefits that the federal government did not authorize, The New York Times reported.
“To the extent States sent full SNAP payment files for November 2025, this was unauthorized,” Patrick Penn, deputy undersecretary of Agriculture, wrote to state SNAP directors.
Kotek in a Sunday news release said Oregon “acted lawfully”hen it restored the funding and said she was “disgusted that President Trump has the audacity to take taxpayers’ money away from them when they are in crisis.”
More than 750,000 Oregonians rely on the food benefits.
Given that the rules are changing quickly, Oregon’s argument would be that it was complying with the rules at the time and with the latest federal judicial order when it moved to restore the November benefits last week before the Supreme Court interceded that night, said Jessica A. Levinson, a constitutional law professor at Loyola Law School.
“In general, though, federal law is supreme and if the federal government can make a successful argument that states are violating law or undermining the ability of the federal government to execute federal law, then states can be fined,” she added.
