DENVER — More than half a million Coloradans are caught in limbo after a Supreme Court ruling abruptly halted SNAP payments, leaving families like Nicole Psilas’ waiting and worried as legal uncertainty deepens.
“It's just been, like, a little bit difficult. It's sort of like a day-by-day thing,” she said.
Psilas is one of more than 560,000 Coloradans who've yet to receive SNAP benefits this November.
“When I can’t sleep… I look at my [EBT] card every night,” Psilas said. “Maybe today, who knows?”
On Friday, Colorado began sending full SNAP payments, bringing hope to recipients.
Hours later, hope faded as the U.S. Supreme Court paused the full payments at the request of the Trump administration.
Friday was a whirlwind of back-and-forth action on this front, with uncertainty looming for impacted families in Colorado.
It’s left people like Psilas feeling frustrated.
“I just wish it would just end. Can we just figure this out? Because it's really stressful,” she said.
On Saturday morning, the Colorado Department of Human Services said it's awaiting additional guidance on this evolving situation.
"Since the Supreme Court’s order, Colorado has not received any new guidance from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA)," the state said. "Colorado is committed to providing SNAP payments as rapidly as possible, while adhering to the latest legal decisions and USDA guidance. The State is evaluating how best to proceed based on the status of current litigation and will have a further update as soon as possible."
In the meantime, Denver7 caught up with Gov. Jared Polis.
“I'm getting update calls on this, literally every hour, we're following what's happening, and as soon as we're allowed to, we will move forward with charging,” Polis said.
Prior to the Supreme Court's ruling on Friday, about 32,000 Coloradans had already received their payments.
Those 32,000 individuals comprise approximately 5% of the total SNAP beneficiaries in Colorado.
We asked, and both Polis and advocates, such as Gina Plata-Nino with the Food Research & Action Center, tell us that money can't be revoked.
“They can't grab them. It's an entitlement program, right? The access, these benefits are theirs,” Plata-Nino said.
She said the next 48 hours could bring some clarity.
“It's very up in the air, and it's really difficult to sort of imagine what the possibilities are, because no other administration has ever done this before,” she said.
Polis is now calling on the Trump administration to drop its appeals.
“Work to open the government, but in the meantime, don't hold hostage people that need their food benefits,” the governor said.
Psilas said she's fortunate enough to have the help of mutual aid Facebook groups and her local food bank as she waits for her SNAP benefits to arrive.
“I hope everybody's getting the help that they need until they can get their benefits,” she said. “But I know that there's probably a lot of people that aren't, and that's pretty scary.”
