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Iowa residents, local businesses, and the state government are projected to lose at least $1 billion over the next ten years as a result of cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) included in the budget reconciliation bill, according to new analysis out today from the Iowa Hunger Coalition.

The budget reconciliation bill, also known as the “One Big Beautiful Bill,” included a $187 billion cut to SNAP, the largest funding cut in the history of the program. Both of Iowa’s Senators and all four of Iowa’s Representatives to the U.S. House voted in favor of the bill. President Trump signed the bill into law on July 4, 2025.

Read IHC’s statement on the passage of the “One Big Beautiful Bill”

Some of the negative impacts from this legislation will be immediately felt, with tens of thousands of Iowans soon to be at risk of losing their SNAP benefits. Other provisions won’t take effect for a few years, and the impact and the source of adverse changes may be less evident. The impending cuts will have devastating consequences for Iowans facing food insecurity, the anti-hunger sector, local communities, and Iowa’s state budget.

Estimated Loss of Funding to Iowa Over the Next Decade Due to SNAP Cuts

• Eliminating Eligibility: -$270 million
  • Expanding work reporting requirements: -$252 million
  • Banning refugees, asylees, and other humanitarian immigrants from SNAP: -$18 million
    
    
• Cutting Future Benefits: -$272 million
  • Freezing future re-evaluations of the Thrifty Food Plan: -$210 million
  • No deductions for internet expenses: -$62 million
    
    
• Loss of Economic Activity: -$293+ million
  • Eliminating eligibility and cutting future benefits will have a ripple effect due to SNAPs economic multiplier effect of 1.54
    
    
• Reductions to the State Budget: -$165-689 million
  • Elimination of the SNAP-Ed program: -$31 million
  • Additional 25% administrative cost-share: -$134 million
  • Benefit cost-share of 0-15%: -$0-524 million
    

Immediate Impacts: Eliminating Eligibility

The most immediate impacts will come from changes to work reporting requirements and eliminating eligibility for refugees, asylees, and other humanitarian immigrants. These provisions technically took effect upon enactment, but it will take some time for the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food and Nutrition Service (USDA FNS) to issue guidance to states to implement the changes. We will know more in the coming weeks and months.

Expanding Work Reporting Requirements

One of the largest policy changes (and subsequent cuts) in the reconciliation bill is an expansion of the three-month time limit for Able-Bodied Adults Without Dependents (ABAWDs), also known as work reporting requirements. This 80 hour/month requirement has already existed for adults ages 18-54 without dependents who were mentally and physically able to work, but has now been expanded to include the following people:

• adults ages 55-64
• parents and caregivers of children ages 14+
• veterans, people who are unhoused, and young adults aging out of foster care (all previously exempt)

Expanding work reporting requirements will reduce SNAP spending in Iowa by an estimated $252 million over the next decade. How? By forcing people off the program who are unable to comply with the onerous new work reporting requirements.

The evidence is clear: work requirements don’t work. They don’t lead to meaningful improvements in employment and earnings. They simply make it harder to apply for and maintain SNAP benefits, even for people who are working. Perhaps this difficulty explains why ABAWDs only make up 3% of Iowa’s SNAP population, according to the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services.

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities estimates that at least 15,000 Iowans could have their SNAP benefits eliminated due to the new work reporting requirements. When a parent or caregiver loses access to SNAP, children in their household still qualify, but the overall household benefit is reduced. In total, 23,000 Iowans on SNAP are at risk of seeing their household SNAP benefit eliminated or reduced.

Banning Refugees and Asylees from SNAP

The budget reconciliation bill also eliminates SNAP eligibility for many legal non-citizens, including refugees, asylees, victims of trafficking, and certain other immigrants here on humanitarian grounds.

According to USDA FNS, in FY 2023 there were approximately 4,000 refugees and asylees participating in SNAP in Iowa, over half of them children and seniors. Thousands of our neighbors who we welcomed into our state will now have their nutrition assistance stripped away from them.

Mid-Term Impacts: The Pivotal Year Ahead

The 2026 federal fiscal year starts on October 1, 2025—just 10 weeks away. The next year will be pivotal for the state of Iowa, the SNAP program, and the outlook of our state budget. The Iowa Department of Health and Human Services will be under an immense amount of pressure to bring Iowa’s SNAP payment error rate below 6% to avoid paying tens of millions of dollars to the federal government, while balancing separate budget crunches as a result of the reconciliation bill.

The Defunding of SNAP-Ed

The SNAP Nutrition Education and Obesity Prevention program, also known as SNAP-Ed, was defunded in the budget reconciliation bill, effectively (though not technically) eliminating the program. Iowa was set to receive $3.1 million in SNAP-Ed funding in FY 2026 that has now been zeroed out.

SNAP-Ed funds a variety of nutrition education programs for low-income people administered by the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services and Iowa State University Extension & Outreach. Iowa also planned to use SNAP-Ed funding to evaluate the effectiveness of its forthcoming SNAP restriction waiver. The future of programs and personnel funded through SNAP-Ed in Iowa is unclear.

Blocking Internet Expenses from Utility Deductions

Under the Biden administration, the USDA issued a final rule change to allow states to include internet expenses when calculating the Standard Utility Allowance (SUA) for SNAP. The rule change had an implementation deadline of October 1, 2025, though some states began implementing the policy change earlier.

The budget reconciliation bill blocked this rule change from going into effect, reversing the policy. Iowans will not have the chance to deduct the cost of internet expenses when determining their SNAP benefits. This may look like $20 less in SNAP benefits for a household every month, but altogether, amasses to $7 million less in SNAP benefits going out to Iowans every year.

An Eye Toward Future Cost-Shifts

Beginning in FY 2027 (October 1, 2026), Iowa will be required to pay an additional 25% of the administrative costs for SNAP, which will cost the state an estimated $13-15 million. This will have a large impact on Iowa’s FY 2027 budget, which is determined during the 2026 Iowa legislative session. Finding a way to fill this gap in the state budget will leave few good options for state legislators.

To make matters worse, an even larger potential cost to state is looming, with a cost-share on SNAP benefits starting in FY 2028, tied to the state’s payment error rate from either FY 2025 or FY 2026. This means the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services will be under an immense amount of pressure from now until October 1, 2026 (and indefinitely into the future) to get Iowa’s SNAP payment error rate below 6%.

Long-Term Impacts: Threats to the State Budget

Cost-Shifts, Budget Implications, and Shifting the Blame

Since its inception, SNAP benefits have always been 100% paid for by the federal government. That is set to change in FY 2028, with states being on the hook for 0-15% of the states’ SNAP benefit amounts, the level of cost-share being determined by the state’s payment error rate (PER) for SNAP. In order to avoid tens of millions of dollars in cost-share on benefits, states must have a payment error rate below 6%. Right now, Iowa’s PER is 6.14%.

If Iowa’s payment error rate doesn’t fall below 6% in FY 2025 or FY 2026, the state will be on the hook for at least $27 million in FY 2028. That’s assuming a 5% cost share on benefits. In the worst case scenario, if Iowa’s PER rises above 10%, the state would be on the hook for over $80 million. This will be an ongoing concern for the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services every year going forward.

Even if Iowa manages to avoid a cost-share on benefits, our HHS budget will still face huge impacts from the additional administrative cost share and the elimination of SNAP-Ed funding. Iowa’s example has shown us that small smart investments, not massive funding cuts, are the most effective way to bring down payment error rates.

Additionally, when a state pays so much attention to addressing the payment error rate, other important performance metrics can fall to the wayside. While Iowa’s PER has stayed relatively low in recent years, application processing timeliness (APT) for SNAP has fallen to the worst rate in two decades.

With all this pressure on the state budget, our elected officials will be forced to cut programs and services as a way of reducing costs and balancing the budget. Whether this comes in the form of further restrictions to SNAP eligibility or cuts to other programs funded through the state’s HHS budget remains to be seen, but this will have far reaching impacts on the services our state government provides to Iowans.

Freezing the Thrifty Food Plan: A Cut to Future Benefits

Another long-term impact of the budget reconciliation bill is preventing future re-evaluations of the Thrifty Food Plan, effectively cutting future benefit increases. Annual adjustments for inflation will continue.

The Thrifty Food Plan is the lowest-cost of the USDA’s four food plans, and is used to calculate SNAP benefit amounts. In the 2018 Farm Bill, Congress directed USDA to modernize how it calculated the Thrifty Food Plan and make updates every five years. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) scored the proposal as cost-neutral.

In 2019, during the COVID-19 pandemic, the USDA under the Biden administration announced it had modernized the Thrifty Food Plan, leading to a permanent 21% increase to SNAP benefits nationwide, and a 27% increase in Iowa. While the budget reconciliation bill did not undo this increase, as some had called for, it does prevent future re-evaluations that are not cost-neutral from being conducted without the approval of Congress.

The 2021 modernization was the first time the Thrifty Food Plan had been re-evaluated in 50 years, so it was understandable that the increase was so significant. But the CBO has projected much smaller increases from future TFP updates.

Had the TFP pause not gone into effect, the average Iowan on SNAP would have seen their monthly benefit increase by $8 in FY 2027 and $7 in FY 2032. This means the average monthly SNAP benefit will be an estimated $15 lower in FY 2034 than it would have been without this bill. It may not be a cut to current benefits, but it’s a cut to benefits nonetheless. Iowans will collectively see $210 million less in SNAP benefits over the next decade as a result.

Loss of Economic Activity

SNAP has an economic multiplier effect of 1.54, meaning that every $1 spent on SNAP generates $1.54 in economic activity. When Iowans have less SNAP benefits to spend on groceries, that has a negative impact on local communities. This could lead to grocery stores closing entirely, creating additional food deserts in urban and rural areas alike.

As a result of Iowans having their future benefits reduced, or losing access to SNAP entirely, policies in the budget reconciliation bill will lead to an additional $306 million in losses in the state of Iowa. This number could increase if the state of Iowa takes any actions to further reduce SNAP eligibility or benefits.

Methodology

These estimates use the Congressional Budget Office’s final July 21, 2025 estimated budgetary effects of the reconciliation bill as a general baseline to determine the impact on Iowa in the following ways:

• The estimated impacts from preventing future Thrifty Food Plan (TFP) re-evaluations and internet from being considered a utility expense were calculated using Iowa’s share of total SNAP benefits in FY 2024.
  
  
• Estimates on eliminating eligibility for refugees and asylees were calculated using Iowa’s share of refugees participating in SNAP from the USDA’s Characteristics of SNAP Households report for FY 2023.
  
  
• The work reporting requirement estimates used data from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities analysis of CBO projections and SNAP Quality Control data from 2022. Because Iowa does not currently have an ABAWD waiver in place, the impacts of that specific policy change were disregarded.
  
  
• The loss of economic funding was estimated using SNAP’s economic multiplier effect of 1.54 (per the USDA Economic Research Service) and the projected loss of SNAP benefits due to policy changes related to eliminating eligibility and reducing future benefit amounts.
  
  
• The projected loss from the defunding of SNAP-Ed was calculated using Iowa’s historical allocation for SNAP-Ed.
  
  
• Additional administrative expenses were calculated using Iowa’s share of SNAP administrative funding dollars in the USDA’s SNAP State Activity Report for FY 2023.
  
  
• Estimates for benefit cost-sharing were calculated based on Iowa’s share of total SNAP benefits in FY 2024, and includes projected benefit losses from eliminating eligibility and reducing future benefit amounts.

The Iowa Hunger Coalition has issued the following statement in response to the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” budget reconciliation bill passed by the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives this week, and signed into law today by President Donald Trump.

The Iowa Hunger Coalition condemns this piece of legislation in the strongest possible terms. It is truly a somber day for Iowa and the United States of America. Tens of thousands of Iowans are now directly at risk of losing access to health care and nutrition assistance.

Iowa Senators Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst both voted in favor of the largest cut to SNAP in the history of the program, as did all four of Iowa’s Representatives in the House: Mariannette Miller-Meeks, Ashley Hinson, Zach Nunn, and Randy Feenstra. Let their names be forever tied to the legacy of harm this legislation will bring.

The SNAP cost-shift provisions included in the budget reconciliation bill will leave the state of Iowa on the hook for upwards of $40 million annually, putting not only SNAP at risk of cuts, but other programs and services funded through the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services.

Tens of thousands of Iowans are now at risk of losing some or all of their SNAP benefits due to the added administrative burden of work reporting requirements. Even more Iowans will be at risk of losing their health care with work reporting requirements for Medicaid. The research on work requirements is clear: they don’t increase employment or earnings, they just force people off benefit programs. And when people lose access to SNAP and Medicaid, that also puts children at risk of losing access to free school meals.

Thousands of refugees, asylees, and other legal non-citizens we’ve welcomed into Iowa on humanitarian grounds are now set to lose their SNAP benefits—over half of them are children and seniors. Iowa’s federal delegation to Congress has forsaken the legacy of Robert Ray, and turned its back on the amazing Iowans who have come from every corner of the globe to call our state home.

All of Iowa’s members of Congress voted in favor of eliminating the SNAP Nutrition Education Program (SNAP-Ed), which funds nutrition education and obesity prevention programs at the Iowa Department of Health and Human Services and Iowa State University Extension & Outreach. Voting to defund SNAP-Ed is entirely unjustifiable and antithetical to the President’s “Make America Healthy Again” agenda.

Despite the rhetoric espoused by politicians attempting to defend their indefensible votes, there is very little waste, fraud, and abuse in SNAP. Based on the state of Iowa’s own data, SNAP has a less than 0.1% fraud rate. Payment errors are not fraud, include both underpayments and overpayments, and when overpayments are identified people must repay them.

The truth is, there is no defending this bill. SNAP enrollment in Iowa is the lowest it has been in 17 years, while food banks and food pantries continue to face record-breaking numbers of people turning to them for assistance. SNAP is already largely inadequate and inaccessible for too many Iowans, but it’s also the absolute best tool we have in the fight against food insecurity.

Every $1 invested in SNAP generates $1.54 in local economic activity, thanks to SNAP’s economic multiplier effect. When people lose access to SNAP, that means less dollars being spent in local communities across our state, urban and rural alike. Fewer grocery stores and more food deserts may be on the horizon for Iowa.

And despite the historic need at food banks and food pantries, despite the fact that food insecurity is increasing in every single county in the state, despite the fact that this bill will harm our state budget and rural communities, Iowa’s elected officials decided it was necessary to vote for the largest cut to SNAP in the history of the program.

Hi everyone, it’s Luke Elzinga, board chair of the Iowa Hunger Coalition. Being an anti-hunger advocate feels a bit like drinking from a fire hose these days. SNAP and other nutrition programs are under increasing threat at the state and federal level, while frontline feeding organizations in Iowa are continually being asked to do more with less.

Before I update you on all the various threats we’re facing right now, I want to extend an invitation to join us next month at IHC’s 2025 Annual Meeting on Friday, June 27, 1:00-3:00pm, in Des Moines.

At the annual meeting, we will be strategizing on policy priorities for the 2026 state legislative session. Please join us to provide your feedback and help collaborate on IHC’s policy agenda for the coming year. Registration is free, and you do not have to be a dues-paying member of IHC to attend. We’d love to see you there!

The 2025 state legislative session has concluded, and unfortunately our legislature did not take meaningful action on common sense solutions to address food insecurity. Despite early positive momentum, we once again saw no state investment in the Double Up Food Bucks program. There were no actions to improve access to SNAP or healthy school meals, though we did help stop a harmful bill that would have waived federal school nutrition standards.

One small win of the 2025 state legislative session was making the Choose Iowa Food Purchasing Program a standing appropriation, and allocating $200,000 for matching funds for local food purchases by food banks and emergency feeding organizations. Unfortunately, this amount was less than last year’s appropriation, and schools are no longer included in the program.

And although we stopped legislation to restrict certain foods and beverages from SNAP, Gov. Kim Reynolds unilaterally requested a waiver from USDA to do so, and it was approved last week. These restrictions will take effect on January 1, 2026. (Read our statement.)

Iowa also recently announced the state has received funding from the federal government to operate Healthy Kids Iowa, a summer feeding demonstration project being billed as an alternative to Summer EBT, which Iowa has refused to participate in. While Summer EBT could have provided 245,000 children with $120 in nutritional benefits on an EBT card, Healthy Kids Iowa aims to assist 65,000 kids by providing $40 worth of food once per month at participating food pantries and summer meal sites. (Read our statement.)

In March, USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins announced the cancellation of local food purchasing programs, leading to a loss of $11.3 million in federal support in Iowa. (Read our statement.)

That same month, Sec. Rollins also announced that USDA was cancelling half a billion dollars for The Emergency Food Assistance Program funded through the Commodity Credit Corporation (CCC). This represents a large portion of total TEFAP dollars, and an estimated loss of $3.8 million in food for Iowa’s food banks and pantries this year. (Read our statement.)

And just last week, the U.S. House of Representatives voted on the largest cut to SNAP in the history of the program. All four of Iowa’s Representatives voted in favor of the reconciliation bill and its $300 billion cut to SNAP.

The good news? We can still stop these massive cuts to SNAP in the Senate. Contact Sen. Joni Ernst and Sen. Chuck Grassley and urge them to reject these severe cuts to SNAP! You can expect to hear more from us in the coming weeks as the Senate attempts to pass their version of the reconciliation bill before the July 4th holiday.

P.S. – We’re always just an email away. If you ever have questions, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us at iowahungercoalition@gmail.com.

Yesterday morning, after an all-night debate, the U.S. House of Representatives passed its budget reconciliation bill, which contains the largest cut to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) in the history of the program. The bill cuts $295 billion in federal funding to SNAP over the next 10 years, a 30% cut to our nation’s largest anti-hunger program. All four members of Iowa’s federal delegation to the House voted in favor of the cuts.

“Every Iowan should know that Rep. Ashley Hinson, Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks, Rep. Zach Nunn, and Rep. Randy Feenstra all just voted for the largest cut to SNAP in the history of the program,” said Luke Elzinga, policy and advocacy manager at the DMARC Food Pantry Network and board chair of the Iowa Hunger Coalition. “Our elected leaders in Congress are failing the people of Iowa.”

Food banks, food pantries, and other anti-hunger organizations across the state continue to contend with record-breaking levels of Iowans turning to them for assistance. According to data recently released by Feeding America’s Map the Meal Gap study, food insecurity increased in every single county of Iowa in 2023. The gap between the number of Iowans experiencing food insecurity and the number of Iowans enrolled in SNAP continues to widen. For too many hungry Iowans, SNAP is already inaccessible and inadequate.

“We should be focusing on streamlining and improving access to SNAP and ensuring greater benefit adequacy,” said Elzinga. “This bill does the complete opposite.”

The House reconciliation bill would shift tens, if not hundreds, of millions of dollars in annual program costs to the state of Iowa, expand work reporting requirements to older adults and parents and caregivers of school-age children, eliminate the SNAP Nutrition Education Program (SNAP-Ed), and freeze Thrifty Food Plan updates, cutting future benefit amounts for Iowans.

“Yesterday’s vote is unconscionable,” said Nicole McAlexander, executive director at Southeast Linn Community Center . “SNAP is the best tool we have in addressing hunger and food insecurity and has very low rates of fraud. If this bill goes through, people will suffer.”

The House budget reconciliation bill not only includes the largest cut to SNAP in history, but the largest cut to Medicaid. These policy changes could also impact the number of children who qualify for free school meals, because when families lose access to SNAP and/or Medicaid, they are no longer automatically eligible for free school meals.

“The House reconciliation bill would do incredible harm to children and families in our state,” said Paige Chickering, Iowa State Manager for Save the Children Action Network. “With hunger and food insecurity rates steadily climbing we need more investment and support for the most vulnerable among us, not massive cuts that will make it much more difficult for hard working Iowan’s to put food on the table for their families.”

The Iowa Hunger Coalition calls on Iowa Senators Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst to push back against these deep, structural cuts to SNAP as the reconciliation bill now heads to the Senate.

“Sen. Grassley and Sen. Ernst have an opportunity to do what’s right and stand up to protect vulnerable Iowans against these devastating cuts,” said Elzinga. “We are calling on all Iowans to contact your Senators and demand they step up to protect SNAP.”

5/23/25 Update: USDA approved Iowa’s SNAP waiver request on May 22, 2025. The state’s final approved waiver does not ban the purchase of garden seeds or food producing plants from purchase with SNAP benefits. Information in this post indicating the opposite has been stricken.

A recent report from Iowa Public Radio found Gov. Kim Reynolds submitted a waiver request to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) on March 12, 2025, to restrict certain foods and beverages from purchase with SNAP benefits. Though this type of state waiver had previously never been granted by the federal government, Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins recently encouraged states to submit “innovative” waiver requests for federal nutrition programs, and Iowa joins a number of states in doing so.

“These restrictions will do nothing to lower the cost of healthy food for Iowans facing hunger and food insecurity,” said Luke Elzinga, board chair of the Iowa Hunger Coalition and policy and advocacy manager at the DMARC Food Pantry Network. “We are disappointed but not surprised by Gov. Kim Reynolds’ waiver request.”

If approved, the waiver would go into effect on January 1, 2026. Based on the document Iowa submitted to USDA in March, the state is seeking to restrict any food or beverage that qualifies for the state sales tax from purchase with SNAP. This list includes:

• garden seeds and food producing plants
• candy, gum, and candy-coated items
• soft drinks, lemonade, and fruit punch
• fruit leather, certain granola bars, and caramel corn

“Iowans should be trusted to make the best food choices for their families,” said Sheila Hansen, IHC board member and senior policy advocate/government relations manager at Common Good Iowa. “Let’s make sure all Iowans have greater access to nutritious food, not punish our low-income neighbors and deny kids a candy bar when they want a treat.”

“Banning garden seeds and food-producing plants from SNAP is counterintuitive,” said John Boller, IHC secretary and executive director of Coralville Community Food Pantry. “If Gov. Reynolds’ idea is to teach a man to fish, so to speak, this waiver request would essentially take away people’s bait and tackle.”

The news comes shortly after the state of Iowa announced a new USDA summer demonstration pilot program, Healthy Kids Iowa, as an alternative to Summer EBT. While many questions remain about how Healthy Kids Iowa will be administered, the program aims to assist 65,000 children in Iowa this summer, far fewer than the 245,000 kids who could have benefited from Summer EBT.

“If Gov. Reynolds’ opposition to participating in Summer EBT was the lack of nutritional focus,” said Elzinga, “why didn’t she elect to submit a similar restriction waiver for Summer EBT and participate in the program?”

“The research is clear, we won’t Make America Healthy Again by banning products from SNAP,” said Paige Chickering, IHC board member and Iowa state manager for Save the Children Action Network. “We need sustained investments in programs we know are effective at improving nutrition, like Double Up Food Bucks, to ensure low income families can afford healthy foods.”

Iowa’s March 12 letter to USDA was sent a week before the first SNAP restriction bill (HSB 216) was even introduced in the Iowa legislature this year, and six weeks prior to the Iowa House passing legislation. That legislation (HF 970) did include a $1 million appropriation for Double Up Food Bucks, but only if Iowa were granted a SNAP restriction waiver by USDA.

HF 970 passed the House despite bipartisan opposition, but died in the Senate. Now, with the 2025 Iowa legislative session drawing to a close, there are no state funds being appropriated toward the Double Up Food Bucks Program.

“Instead of investing in evidence-based solutions to improve healthy eating, the state of Iowa is choosing to experiment on low-income Iowans’ grocery carts,” said Nicole McAlexander, IHC vice chair and executive director of Southeast Linn Community Center. “The only thing we know this will do is increase stigma for SNAP participants and perpetuate misconceptions about hard-working, hungry Iowans.”

As a waiver request, Iowa is required to conduct an evaluation to study its impact. According to the March 12 document submitted to USDA, Iowa aims to study the effectiveness of a SNAP restriction ban by comparing the healthy eating behaviors between SNAP participants who receive nutrition education and those who do not. This evaluation seems to propose measuring the effectiveness of nutrition education paired with a SNAP food restriction, and not the effectiveness of the restriction on its own. Along with WIC nutrition education, Iowa plans to use participation in SNAP-Ed to conduct this research, a program which is currently being proposed for elimination in the U.S. House reconciliation budget.