Utah SNAP recipients to receive November benefits; exact timeline remains unclear

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KEY TAKEAWAYS

• About 86,000 Utahns may receive some November SNAP benefits amid the ongoing shutdown.
• The Utah Department of Workforce Services received emergency federal funding for SNAP.
• Details on payment timing and amounts remain unclear as logistics are finalized.

SALT LAKE CITY — More than 80,000 Utahns who rely on Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits to receive November payments after all, but as of Thursday, it's not exactly clear when it will happen.

The Utah Department of Workforce Services posted an alert to its website on Wednesday with an update regarding November SNAP payments.

"We received emergency funding from the federal government and can now issue some SNAP benefits for November," the bulletin reads. "We are working through this process and will have more information about what this means for you this week."

Due to the ongoing government shutdown, which has persisted for more than a month and is now officially the longest one on record, payments for the federal program were initially said to be halted for November, the Utah Department of Workforce Services announced last month.

On Monday, the Trump administration said it would partially fund SNAP benefits, also known as food stamps, following a ruling from two federal judges on Friday that said it needed to keep the federal program afloat, the Associated Press reported.

Utah Senate Democrats also penned a letter to Gov. Spencer Cox on Tuesday, urging him and legislative leaders to call a special session to authorize rainy day funds to cover SNAP for the month of November.

DWS spokesperson Becky Wickstrom told KSL.com Thursday evening that she didn't have any firm answers as to when people waiting on SNAP payments may receive them, but the department hopes to know more soon.

"What I can tell you is that we have federal guidance to issue emergency funding and are working through the logistics of that," she said.

Wickstrom and the Department of Workforce Services also couldn't say whether or not recipients will get their full payment amounts or any information at this point, regarding December deposits.

Guidance from the U.S Department of Agriculture for reduced payment allotments varies depending on household size.

A full breakdown of those anticipated payment amounts can be found here.

The Key Takeaways for this article were generated with the assistance of large language models and reviewed by our editorial team. The article, itself, is solely human-written.

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Utah governmentUtahFamilyPolitics
Curtis Booker

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Curtis Booker is a reporter for KSL.com.