The Daily Signal - SNAP Benefits Legal Mess, Coastal Americans Gear Up for "Toss Up" Off-year Elections | Nov. 3, 2025

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Starting point is 00:00:25 We'd love to talk. Business. Two federal judge orders on SNAP benefits send the legal world into an absolute mess, while Democrat officials argue about what should be done to end their government shutdown. And coastal Americans gear up for off-year elections far too close to toss-up territory. I'm Tony Kinnett, host of the Daily Signals Tony Kinnett cast, syndicated nationally at 7 p.m. Eastern. It is Monday, November 3, 2025. This is the Daily Signals, top news in 10.

Starting point is 00:01:01 On Friday, October 31st, hours before the SNAP benefits were set to expire, an emergency order from U.S. District Judge Indira Telwani in Boston stated that the Trump administration must resume SNAP benefits immediately, ruling that the plaintiffs who filed the lawsuit are likely to succeed on their claims that the suspension of the benefits is unlawful. Even though the benefits aren't suspended per a law, but simply because Congress did not choose to fund them through the Congress. the progressionally obligated power of the purse, passing the Republicans' clean continuing resolution. Due to Senate Democrats, choosing not to vote in large part for said continuing resolution and failing to meet that 60-vote threshold. Tawani ordered the government to provide the court no later than today, November 3rd, with additional details on how it plans to keep the program funded and whether the appropriated benefits must be distributed in full or in part. moments later, a separate federal judge in Rhode Island also ordered the Trump administration to continue funding SNAP benefits throughout the shutdown.

Starting point is 00:02:10 District Judge John McConnell said the administration has to tap emergency contingency funds to pay for SNAP benefits, quote, as soon as possible next month. The issue poised by the Trump administration is that the government doesn't have the ability in this particular instance via the executive office to use contingency funds to fund SNAP benefits, as this doesn't constitute a national emergency. National emergencies would be things like famine, invasion, some kind of natural disaster like a hurricane or a wildfire that function as some type of an act of God or something outside of normal congressional control. Getting 60 votes from senators should not theoretically at least

Starting point is 00:02:51 be something that requires an act of God and the power of the purse Congress is over is just something Congress is supposed to be able to manning. The Trump administration has responded to the federal judges, saying, if you can outline how we can use contingency funds in this case without violating federal law, we would be more than happy to do so. In fact, President Trump posted something to this exact nature on Truth Social on Friday. Governor Josh Shapiro, Democrat of Pennsylvania, announced that he was suing the Trump administration, along with several other states, for what he called a targeted closing off of SNAP benefits. I want you to know that earlier this week I sued the Trump administration demanding that they release that contingency funding to keep our SNAP benefits flowing in the common

Starting point is 00:03:41 way. I want to take a moment and thank Mike Fisher and Jacob Boyer from my team who joined me here, the lead lawyers in this case. And I want to provide you with an update that just occurred a few moments ago. The judge in our case ruled that the Trump administration must turn the spiket on and must release these SNAP dollars. U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rawlins, who is one of the individuals who has stated that the United States cannot use these contingency funds for emergency orders,

Starting point is 00:04:15 step up onto Fox News Sunday show to offer a little bit of clarity on what's going on regarding the USDA and SNAP benefits. Day, day one of USDA, February 13th, is we sent letters to every governor in America being very clear that no illegal aliens can use SNAP. Zero, zero, zero. We asked every state for the first time in history, and this was in February, to send us their data and let us with Doge and a war room actually start going through this data to better understand how this explosion of SNAP benefits happened under Joe Biden. We increased almost 40% on this program in just a couple of years under the Biden administration. Of course, we know they were trying to buy the election, but that's

Starting point is 00:04:58 conversation for another time. And since we have asked for that data, 29 states have complied. Of course, almost all the red states, a couple of the, you know, the couple of blue states, too. But in that data, and I haven't talked about this yet publicly, in that data, we have found, we've studied about $100 billion in spend. We have found thousands and thousands of illegal use of the EBT card. We have been moving people off of SNAP. We've got almost 700,000. people. I think we've moved off just since the president took office. We've arrested about 118 people. So this has been ongoing. But Rachel, to your point, what this conversation has allowed is a national spotlight on a broken and corrupt program. In the meantime, Democrats are arguing about what should be done to end their government shutdown from their perspective, while individuals like House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries received an interesting reaction from C.S.

Starting point is 00:05:58 in-in-ends Jake Tapper on their state of the union regarding what should be done regarding the government shutdown and who's at fault? The question is why are Republicans continuing to keep the government shut down? They have the House, the Senate, and the presidency. Donald Trump just made clear over the weekend repeatedly that Republicans have the ability to reopen this government. They don't want to do it because they'd rather continue to gut the health care of the American people. Senator Tim Cain, Democrat of Virginia, said that it was the president's receipts, responsibility to gather the senators together and craft a new way forward to end the shutdown. You know, Martha, I'm a United States senator. And yeah, I run as a Democrat and I'm a Democrat,

Starting point is 00:06:39 but I just don't approach my work that way. So when you ask what Democrats have gained, what we're focused on is the American people. We want President Trump to stop firing people, canceling economic development projects. We wanted to stop raising everybody's costs, you know, health care costs, energy costs, housing costs, Halloween's more expensive. Thanksgiving is more expensive. The holidays are going to be more expensive. So we're asking the president to simply sit down and do what all presidents do.

Starting point is 00:07:08 We can find a budget deal that puts us on a path to a health care fix. John Federman stated on CNN State of the Union that it was unilaterally the Democrat Party's fault and that it was therefore their responsibility to vote in favor for the continuing resolution and thus end the shutdown. Well, I mean, for me, fundamentally, I'm deeply distressing. to know that 42 million Americans are going to lose their SNAP benefits. And now that's one of the big reasons why I refuse to shutting our government down. And again, I feel like the Democrats really need to own the shutdown.

Starting point is 00:07:40 I mean, we're shutting it down. I know why they claim because they want to address the tax credits. And I fully support that. I voted for all of their CRs, RCRs every single time. And I refuse to put 42 million Americans in the kinds of food insecurity. Now, this is all solved by just reopen our government and the people are now paid. Now if we are, we are the party that are fighting for working people. Now as far as I'm aware, every single union that's involved in this now is now demanding to us to reopen that.

Starting point is 00:08:16 Those are, that's the side that I'm in through this. And lastly, coastal Americans are gearing up for tomorrow's 2025 off-year elections, many of which are far too close to toss-up territory. These include the Virginia and the New Jersey gubernatorial elections, which have many major Democrat officials heading towards campaign rallies instead of the jobs they're supposed to be doing. These include California Governor Gavin Newsom, who has his own off-year election he's gearing up for. That would be Proposition 50, which Californians would vote on in order to set a redistricting

Starting point is 00:08:49 process quite a bit earlier. And former vice president and Democrat presidential candidate Kamala Harris have been absent from not just the campaign rallies, but also any mention from any of the Democratic campaigns on the coasts whatsoever. Instead, former Vice President Kamala Harris appears to be speaking on a number of issues important to her, like President Trump's ballroom. Are you fucking kidding me? This guy wants to create a ballroom for his rich friends while completely turning a blind eye to the fact that babies are going to starve when the SNAP benefits end in just hours from now? Come on. So what I'm

Starting point is 00:09:26 I'm not going to be distracted by, oh, does the guy have a big fucking hammer? As well as her reaction to losing to the president, November of 2024. I was in a state of shock. Really? Did you think the day before that you were going to win? Mm-hmm. Yeah. And so when did the proverbial penny drop?

Starting point is 00:09:45 When I got a call from my campaign manager, that it looks like we need 200,000 more votes that we can't find. Meaning it's just the map, the numbers. And the thing I kept saying over and over again, I was in a state of shock, I was, I was so inarticulate, but maybe very articulate, what I kept saying over and over again is my God, my God, my God. Really? Over and I couldn't stop.

Starting point is 00:10:19 I haven't felt that emotion, anything similar to the emotion, I felt that day and for quite some time, other than the grief I felt when my mother died. I knew what was going to happen to our country. I knew, I knew the harm that was going to happen to people. Before you go, head down to the description and make sure you're subscribed to the Tony Kinnettcast and join us tonight at 7 p.m. Eastern for a roundup of the day's news and nonsense. And do not miss our election coverage starting at 7 p.m. Eastern tomorrow and going and going until, well, until we get tired of covering it. We've got some great boots on the ground

Starting point is 00:11:04 interviews from some of those major campaign territories, as well as some updates that you won't hear anywhere else. I'm Tony Kinnett, and this has been The Daily Signals. Top News in 10. Take care.

The Daily Signal - SNAP Benefits Legal Mess, Coastal Americans Gear Up for "Toss Up" Off-year Elections | Nov. 3, 2025

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