Resource Library

Criminals are attacking the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) by stealing benefits from participants through “skimming” crimes. Learn more about this rising form of Electronic Benefit Transfer fraud in FRAC’s fact sheet. 

Too many children are missing out on afterschool snacks and suppers offered by the Afterschool Nutrition Programs. Learn more in FRAC’s report, Afterschool Suppers: A Snapshot of Participation – October 2023.

Under the Intergovernmental Personnel Act of 1970, roles involving eligibility determination and certification must be performed by merit-based employees – nonpartisan public service employees who receive extensive training and develop the deep knowledge necessary to guide SNAP applicants, conduct SNAP certification interviews, and make final decisions on SNAP eligibility and benefits. Learn why Congress should continue to uphold the merit system in FRAC’s fact sheet, SNAP Merit Staff Preserve Program Integrity. 

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, formerly known as food stamps) is a critical program that provides people with low incomes, including women, LGBTQIA+ people, and their families with essential food assistance. SNAP helps ensure that women and LGBTQIA+ people can meet their basic needs and supports their well-being. But while SNAP plays a crucial role in alleviating food insufficiency for women and families, currently, there are barriers that prevent food-insecure women, especially those facing multiple forms of discrimination, from fully accessing and benefiting from SNAP. Learn more in FRAC’s updated 2024 research brief with the National Women’s Law Center, Gender and Racial Justice in SNAP.

Efforts by health care providers to address food insecurity continue to grow. FRAC’s new research brief underscores the importance of connecting patients to SNAP, WIC, and other federal nutrition programs as the foundational intervention to address food insecurity in health care settings;
provides key steps that health care providers can take to connect patients to federal nutrition programs; and synthesizes research on food insecurity interventions in health care settings that featured connecting patients to SNAP and WIC. Learn more in Connecting Patients to SNAP and WIC in Health Care Settings.

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is the cornerstone of the nation’s nutrition and food security safety net, helping to put food on the table for over 41 million participants each month. Congress must protect the Thrifty Food Plan and other SNAP provisions from any cuts. Use this 2024 Leave Behind in your advocacy. 

The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) empowers program participants to make choices about what food is right for them. Through SNAP, people with lived experience of hunger and poverty can make decisions for themselves and their families, and use their purchasing power to make those decisions without shame or stigma. Learn why protecting SNAP choice is so urgent in FRAC’s latest research brief. 

Congress must adhere to bipartisan and public support to preserve consumer choice for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) in the FY 2024 Agriculture Appropriations Bill, the upcoming Farm Bill, and any other legislative vehicles. Learn more about preserving consumer choice in SNAP in FRAC’s latest-one pager. 

FRAC’s Food Fuels Futures: Expanded SNAP Eligibility Reduces Hunger Among College Students research brief — informed by interviews with college students — sets forth reasons why SNAP student eligibility expansions in response to the COVID-19 pandemic were so vital to college students and why decision-makers should build on these lessons and eliminate the “work-to-eat rule” so that more college students can focus on learning rather than being distracted by hunger. 

By providing benefits to purchase food, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is vital to supporting the nutrition, health, and well-being of people experiencing homelessness. New temporary SNAP time limit exemptions went into effect September 1 — including for people experiencing homelessness — pursuant to the 2023 Fiscal Responsibility Act. Ensuring that the time limit exemptions for the newly exempt people experiencing homelessness are implemented effectively is an important strategy to improve their access to SNAP. Learn more in this new fact sheet from FRAC, the National Alliance to End Homelessness, and Opportunity Starts at Home. 

By providing benefits to purchase food, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is vital to supporting the nutrition, health, and well-being of young adults who are exiting foster care. Even so, too many of these eligible young adults miss out on SNAP. On September 1, new temporary SNAP time limit exemptions went into effect including for young adults, 18 to 24 years of age, who have left foster care, pursuant to the 2023 Fiscal Responsibility Act (FRA).1 Ensuring that the new time limit exemption for young people with experience in foster care is implemented effectively is an important strategy to improve their access to SNAP. Learn more in FRAC’s new fact sheet.

By providing benefits to purchase food, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is vital to supporting the nutrition, health, and well-being of military veterans. New temporary SNAP time limit exemptions went into effect September 1, including for veterans (e.g., people with military experience regardless of the conditions of their discharge or release) pursuant to the 2023 Fiscal Responsibility Act. Ensuring that the time limit exemptions for the newly exempt are implemented effectively is an important strategy to improve veterans’ access to SNAP.

A significant number of children missed out on nutritious suppers and snacks offered by the Afterschool Nutrition Programs, according to FRAC’s latest report, Afterschool Suppers: A Snapshot of Participation – October 2021 and October 2022.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has released the fiscal year 2024 cost-ofliving adjustments (COLA) for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), including updates to maximum allotments, deductions, and income eligibility thresholds, which are effective October 1, 2023. Learn more in FRAC’s new research brief. 

The Thrifty Food Plan (TFP), which offers the lowest of the four major food plans the federal government uses, sets the maximum amount of food dollars Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) participants can receive. Despite a long overdue update of the TFP in 2021, the plan still leaves SNAP participants short of the benefit amounts sufficient for food for the entire month. This research brief explains why SNAP should switch from the TFP model to the more equitable Low-Cost Food Plan to equip participants with fuller plates and improved health and well-being.