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Government shutdown updates: Judge lays out path for SNAP benefits

The administration could use $5 billion in emergency funds and tariff revenue.

ByDavid Brennan, Alexandra Hutzler, and Ivan Pereira
Last Updated: November 2, 2025, 3:21 PM EST

Republican and Democratic lawmakers remain at a stalemate on finding a government funding solution to end what is now the second-longest shutdown in U.S. history.

The Senate on Thursday adjourned until Monday afternoon, which will mark the 34th day of the government shutdown. 

Meanwhile, a federal judge has laid out a path for the administration to fund SNAP benefits, which ran out on Saturday, saying the administration could tap more than $5 billion in emergency funds, as well as a much larger pot of tariff revenue collected by the Agriculture Department to fund the program.

Key Headlines

Here's how the news is developing.
Oct 31, 2025, 11:30 AM EDT

Thune remains against ending Senate filibuster

Senate Majority Leader John Thune’s position against eliminating the Senate filibuster has not changed, a spokesperson told ABC News Friday, after Trump on Thursday called on Republicans to go "nuclear" and eliminate the filibuster to pass the Republican funding bill and reopen the government.

“Leader Thune’s position on the importance of the legislative filibuster is unchanged,” spokesperson Ryan Wrasse said in a statement, after Thune ruled out the gambit earlier this month as a path to end the shutdown.

Thune has long stood firm in his position against abolishing the time-honored chamber procedure that requires consensus from 60 of the Senate’s 100 members to advance most legislation -- as recently as Oct. 10, saying that the legislative tactic has long "protected" the upper chamber from operating as a majority party monopoly.

-ABC News' Isabella Murray, Lauren Peller and John Parkinson

Oct 31, 2025, 10:31 AM EDT

Johnson dodges question about Trump's request to end filibuster

Speaker Johnson was asked about Trump's social media post that called on Senate Republicans to end the filibuster to end the shutdown.

Johnson said that he saw the post, but didn't talk to Trump about it.

"What you are seeing an expression of the president's anger at the situation," he said. "He just desperately wants the government to be reopened."

The speaker reiterated that the filibuster is a Senate matter.

Oct 31, 2025, 10:27 AM EDT

Agriculture Secretary Rollins denies USDA has money to help pay for SNAP

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins told reporters that reports that the USDA has money to help pay for SNAP benefits is "absolutely false."

"It is a lie," she said.

Rollins acknowledged that the agency has a contingency fund, but it does not cover "even a half" of the $9.2 billion required for SNAP benefits.

"It is only allowed to flow if the underlying program is funded," she claimed.

Oct 31, 2025, 10:08 AM EDT

Johnson blames Democrats for end of SNAP benefits

House Speaker Mike Johnson again on Friday laid the blame of the pending end to SNAP benefit funding on Democrats and contended that the Trump "administration has done all it can."

"The Democrats continue with their political games in Washington," he said, adding that the Senate Democrats have "abandoned their post."

Johnson has not called the House back into session in over a month.

He reiterated that the Democratic senators needed to come and pass the clean CR bill.

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