No longer eligible for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program are refugees, asylees, humanitarian parolees, immigrants granted conditional entries and more. Undocumented immigrants were already not eligible for SNAP benefits.
The Congressional Budget Office estimated that in a typical month, this new restriction would lead to 90,000 people becoming ineligible for SNAP nationwide.
When the federal government shut down in October and into November, the 1.4 million Ohioans who receive a total of $264 million in food benefits from SNAP each month had delayed payments to their EBT cards.
Catholic Social Services of the Miami Valley CEO Laura Roesch said the shutdown saw an influx to her organization’s pantry, which serves roughly 140 households daily.
Catholic Social Services of the Miami Valley is the region’s refugee resettlement provider — that federal program paused in January — and serves hundreds of local refugees and other immigrants who fled their countries through additional support services.
Roesch said Catholic Social Services offered additional walk-in hours and language support to families who had questions about their benefits, inviting representatives of the Montgomery County and Ohio Departments of Job and Family Services to meet with refugees.
“We wanted to make sure that we provided additional supports so that our clients we’re serving would understand the change in their eligibility and would understand where to access additional food supports if needed,” Roesch said.
Dayton is home to hundreds of refugees. The Ohio Department of Job and Family Services reported that 456 of these refugees were resettled in the Dayton area in 2024. The state jobs department does not report the number of asylees by county in Ohio.
When the federal government reopened in November, the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services made statewide system updates to mirror the new federal requirements.
Montgomery County Administrator Michael Colbert said that as part of those updates, the Ohio Benefits system automatically discontinued or adjusted benefits for individuals who no longer met federal eligibility rules.
“This was a statewide process, not a county-level decision,” Colbert said.
An ODJFS spokesperson said the department does not have data related to how many people were impacted by the federal eligibility changes, but the department is on track to have most federal changes to SNAP benefits implemented by February.
Montgomery County officials estimated in November that 1,270 local individuals were impacted.
This represents less than 2% of the total SNAP recipient population in the county reported before the government reopened.
Discontinuance or benefit change notices were sent directly to affected individuals by the state jobs department. Heather Campbell, a staff attorney at Advocates for Basic Legal Equity, said some families attending legal clinics during the federal shutdown reported receiving these notices, even though they were issued green cards.
Campbell said her office partnered with a health care and public benefits team to assist families who had questions about their benefits ending.
Lawful permanent residents, like green card holders, are eligible for SNAP benefits if they have held that status for five years, according to the USDA. Immigrants who had their green card prior to the passage of H.R. 1 could have been eligible for SNAP benefits due to another status they had.
Roesch said how this impacts hunger locally “remains to be seen.”
“That’s why organizations like ours are so important. They’re able to fill that gap to direct people to the resources that they need in these times of uncertainty,” Roesch said.
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