10. Department of Agriculture · Notable
Close the SNAP broad-based categorical eligibility loophole
Printed page 300 10. Department of Agriculture
“Reform broad-based categorical eligibility. Federal law permits states to enroll individuals in food stamps if they receive a benefit from another program, such as the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program. … The Trump Administration proposed to close the loophole with a rule to “increase program integrity and reduce fraud, waste, and abuse.” The regulation was not finalized before the end of the Trump Administration.”
What has happened
- Attempted
USDA has formally put the rule back on its regulatory agenda but has not published it. The 2026 Unified Agenda (published 2026-08-14) carries FNS RIN 0584-AF10, "Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program: Reforming Categorical Eligibility", at proposed-rule stage and rated Economically Significant: it would amend 7 CFR 273.2(j)(2) to limit categorical eligibility to households receiving cash TANF or other substantial TANF assistance, and its "Alternatives" entry says the Department considered and departed from the framework of the 2019 proposed rule — i.e. it is the successor to the rule the Quote says was never finalized. No NPRM had been published as of 2026-08-28: a Federal Register full-text search for "broad-based categorical eligibility" across the window returns one document, an unrelated SNAP information-collection notice.
Research log
What was searched, and what didn’t count as evidence
Research notes
- A boundary call: a Unified Agenda entry with no published NPRM is read here as attempted (a formal, dated public commitment to the rule the Quote names). The alternative reading is not started. The same view was taken on #1259 (HHS OCR RIN 0945-AA24).
- Congress did not close the loophole either: P.L. 119-21’s nutrition subtitle (Secs. 10101-10108) touches the Thrifty Food Plan, work requirements, utility allowances, internet expenses, matching funds, cost sharing, obesity-prevention grants and alien eligibility, and leaves 7 U.S.C. 2014(a) categorical eligibility untouched.
- Action
- restrict
- Object
- SNAP broad-based categorical eligibility
- ID
- 777