According to a study, 2.5 million Americans lost food aid within months of the GOP megabill’s passage

At least 2.5 million low-income people quickly lost food assistance because of a Republican-passed law that added novel requirements for the nation’s largest nutrition program and shifted hundreds of millions of dollars in costs from the federal government to states, according to a study released Wednesday by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

About 6% of the 41 million Americans who were enrolled in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) when President Donald Trump signed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act on July 4, 2025, were no longer receiving benefits at year’s end.

The left-leaning think tank’s report was based on data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture and state agencies from July to December 2025.

Arizona was the biggest outlier in the data: A whopping 47% of program participants — about 424,000 Arizona residents — lost their benefits in 2025, according to the think tank, which cited last year’s USDA numbers as well as more recent state agency data.

Data from the USDA, which operates the federal side of SNAP, shows an even larger decline of 3.4 million people for the full year of 2025, or about 8% of the program’s total, CBPP said. SNAP is funded by the federal government and administered by states, but this cost sharing will change under law.

In an email delayed Wednesday, a USDA spokesperson welcomed the decline in SNAP participation, noting that the number of program participants fell below 40 million for the first time since the pandemic. The spokesperson said the program will continue to “serve those in greatest need while strengthening the integrity of the program.”

“This change reflects several factors, including the most comprehensive work requirements reform since 1996, the One Big Beautiful Bill of 2025, as well as USDA initiatives that expand access to employment services, career and technical education, and case management assistance through the USDA More Than a Job campaign,” the spokesperson wrote.

Incentives for States

The study “I have no intention of finding a cause for the decline,” said co-author Joseph Llobrera, CBPP’s senior research director for food aid, in an interview. However, he noted that the law creates incentives for states to limit participation in the program.

Under a provision of the law that has not yet taken effect, the share of program costs that states must cover is tied to the state’s “error rate” – the ratio of payments made to people who should not have been eligible for benefits.

That motivates states to restrict access to the program without providing a commensurate reward for expanding access, Llobrera said.

“The incentive structure in place is really pushing states to make it harder for people who need this assistance to access the program,” he said.

The decline in participation occurred without an improvement in economic conditions, such as a decline in the unemployment rate, the researchers said.

That suggests people are coming off the list because of changes in the program, not because their circumstances have improved to the point where they no longer need food assistance, the study says.

Many provisions of the law have not yet come into force. For example, the error rate penalties begin in fiscal year 2028.

Design, no mistake

In part, however, this limitation is intentional because the law’s proponents intended to cut SNAP benefits for recipients who met certain criteria and to control what they portrayed as fraud and waste at the state level.

The Reductions in the federal share of SNAP funding helped finance massive tax cuts and increases in military spending in other parts of the megabill, which Republicans passed without any Democratic support in a process known as budget reconciliation.

Proponents of the agriculture portion of the megabill argued for provisions that would require beneficiaries to report their eligibility more frequently, boost work requirements, exclude certain categories of legal immigrants, raise the age at which raising children would no longer be considered work, and otherwise tighten the availability of the program.

The provisions would assist ensure that only those who truly need the federal aid receive it, advocates said.

It would also create an incentive for states to control erroneous payments, which was not the case when the federal government covered the entire cost of the program before the bill’s passage.

“Relying on SNAP is a disservice to those truly in need,” said House Agriculture Chairman Glenn “GT” Thompson, a Republican from Pennsylvania, as the committee drafted the bill last year. “SNAP is clearly not working as Congress intended. We must ensure the right incentives are in place for states to administer the program more effectively for those it serves.”

Llobrera said he understood the rhetoric in favor of increasing restrictions on the program, but that the center at the time “sounded the alarm bell that the bill would harm people.”

A spokesman for Thompson did not respond to a request for comment Wednesday.

Arizona

The CBPP report contained a Breakout area in Arizona, where SNAP enrollment fell much more than any other state.

As in other states, economic gains did not explain the changes in Arizona, the case study says.

“This dramatic decline cannot be explained by a rapid improvement in people’s economic well-being or a reduced need for assistance in obtaining food,” the report says, noting that Arizona’s unemployment rate increased over the sample period while food costs increased by about 4% in 2025.

The state’s Democratic governor, Katie Hobbs, and state agency spokesmen blamed the GOP law for the drastic reduction in benefits, the study said, but the decline went beyond what would be expected under the law’s provisions.

That suggests state administrations — even under Democratic leaders — are going beyond the minimum legal requirements to restrict access, the authors said.

“It appears, then, that a combination of factors, including the Megabill and the state’s response to it, are contributing to the sharp decline in the number of Arizona families receiving SNAP,” they wrote.

Because the law also increases the cost of administering the program for states and requires states to pay more than just a portion of benefits, some, including Arizona, have already cut staff before the law takes effect, Llobrera said.

“With the cuts in administrative funding for states due to this mega-bill, they will only accelerate,” he said.

Switch off

Such changes to SNAP rules created an already turbulent time for the program’s recipients. Over the course of one then record-long Partial government shutdown last year, benefits were constantly switched off and on again The Trump administration said it could not spend SNAP funds during a shutdown, and federal courts ruled that benefits must be paid.

White House spokespeople did not respond to messages seeking comment on Wednesday.