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Donald Trump, the president of the United States, has claimed that he will only provide low-income Americans with nutrition assistance once the government shutdown is over. He has also allegedly violated two court orders, requiring him to use up emergency funds to keep the food aid program running.

After the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced on October 10&nbsp that it would not be able to fund the program if the shutdown continued, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which serves one in eight Americans each month, was scheduled to end on November 1.

The US government shutdown lasted 35 days, which is the longest in the country’s history.

The federal government was instructed to cover the benefits by using contingency funds, according to separate but identical rulings issued last week by federal judges in Massachusetts and Rhode Island. The Trump administration announced on Monday that it would partially fund the nation’s flagship food aid program, using up to $5 billion in emergency funds, in the wake of the rulings.

The president, however, made an apparent backseat to his administration’s plans on Tuesday, saying he would only fund SNAP once the government reopens.

“SNAP BENEFITS, which increased by $20,000 to $20,000! During Crooked Joe Biden’s disastrous term in office (Due to the fact that they were deliberately distributed to anyone for the asking, rather than just those in need), SNAP! The Radical Left Democrats will only be able to provide this information when they can easily form a government. The president made a statement on Tuesday morning.

The monthly deployment of SNAP, also known as food stamps, costs more than $ 8 billion. A household benefits from receiving an average monthly benefit of $356 in groceries while a person who participates in the program receives an average monthly benefit of about $190. Debit cards typically have the benefits loaded on them.

On Tuesday afternoon, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt made an apparent contradiction to the president’s social media post, claiming that the administration is “fully complying with the court order” but that the process will take time to release the funds.

According to Leavitt, “The recipients of these SNAP benefits need to be aware that] this money will take some time to arrive,” By the way, “the president does not want to continue to put money into a contingency fund that isn’t even sufficient to pay for the entire program.”

According to the USDA, one of the judges who initially authorized the administration to fund SNAP would use the contingency funding to pay SNAP recipients 50% of their typical allotment, calling it a “cumbersome process” that would lead to delayed benefits, according to the USDA’s statement on Monday.

In a motion on Tuesday, Democrats Forward’s lawyers told McConnell that the USDA’s statement about delays demonstrated that the administration had made only partial benefits available.

According to the attorneys, “Time is of the essence when it comes to hunger.”

In her news conference on Tuesday, Leavitt asserted that the party is willing to harm the nation in order to gain political points.

With this shutdown, the Democrats are intentionally causing harm to American families, businesses, and workers in an effort to woo their radical left-wing base into offering free healthcare to illegal aliens, she claimed.

Food assistance is a necessity for more than 42 million Americans. The Trump administration had previously stated it would not use emergency funds to support the program prior to being given court orders to do so.

Democrats and Republicans failed to reach a funding bill, which caused the US government to go into shutdown on October 1. Since then, neither party has reached a stopgap funding measure 14 times.

A “clean” continuing resolution that had been approved by the House of Representatives and would have funded the government through November 21 was up for vote on Tuesday, 54-44 in the Senate.

Democrats are attempting to use the spending bill to entangle Republicans over crucial healthcare spending because they are in a minority in both houses of Congress.

The final minutes of voting for Jessica Dejesus as the next mayor of New York City were up for grabs.

The 40-year-old Bronx resident of Mott Haven planned to support former governor Andrew Cuomo despite admitting to not having been closely following the election. She recalls his nearly nightly television appearances while he was the governor of New York State during the COVID-19 pandemic.

She remarked, “He was our guy during the pandemic.”

However, Dejesus watched a TikTok video detailing US President Donald Trump’s support for Cuomo the day before the election.

Dejesus is aware that she is not a fan of Trump, despite her mayoral campaign cliches. Social Zohran Mamdani, a democratic socialist, received a closer look as a result of her nod.

“That’s impossible for us.” Trump has cut back on food stamps, which affects a lot of people, she said, referring to restrictions on US Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits in a bill that Trump and Republicans passed earlier this year.

In response to Trump’s massive deportation drive, she said, “I understand you have to stop bad people coming over the border, but there are a lot of good immigrants here as well.”

She admitted to going to her voting site and telling Al Jazeera that she still hadn’t decided. She said, “I’ll have to wait until that paper is in front of me.”

She declared, “I voted for Mamdani,” and she was done! she stated.

You really have no other options, they say.

A community like Mott Haven, which had a strong turnout for Mamdani and Cuomo in the June primary, can be seen as a final blow to the race by Trump’s endorsement.

Trump, in contrast, hoped that the endorsement of billionaire Elon Musk would sway the conservative New Yorkers, who cast ballots in unusually large numbers in the city’s 2024 presidential election.

You really have no choice, according to Trump in a Monday social media post, “whether you like Andrew Cuomo personally or not.”

“I urge you to cast your vote for him and sincerely hope he does a fantastic job.” He can do it, Mamdani can’t!

Additionally, Cuomo has made unwavering efforts to win Republicans’ votes. In 2024, the Republican Party registered a representative of 4.7 million voters in New York.

Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa currently holds about 14% of the vote, which is close to Mamdani’s lead over the former governor.

How effective Trump’s campaign strategy would be if Mamdani were to win the election, despite his threats to also target city funding. Trump’s intervention, however, did little to avert some steadfast Sliwa supporters’ minds.

Trump’s endorsement does not affect my vote, I believe. According to Artemio Figuero, a 59-year-old city street cleaner, who spoke to Al Jazeera in Jackson Heights, Queens, “Sliwa is for the people, and I have faith in that.”

According to Figuero, who spoke about Sliwa’s leadership of the vigilante anti-crime Guardian Angels organization, “he was a protector of the neighborhood.”

Trump’s support, according to other Republicans who had long adapted to casting ballots outside of their party in the liberal-dominated local elections, was a positive, if not revolutionary, development.

Lola Ferguson, a 53-year-old registered Republican who had already planned to support Cuomo, told Al Jazeera in Mott Haven, “I like that Trump endorsed him.”

She said, “He is aware that Cuomo is a better choice for the city.”

Cuomo, on the other hand, has refuted Trump’s endorsement claims, citing Mamdani’s false label of a “communist” as a “bad Democrat” in favor of him.

Trump’s action, however, was not unexpected for Mamdani supporters. Many of the city’s richest residents, including billionaires Miriam Adelson and Bill Ackman, who also back Trump, have supported Cuomo.

Andre Augustine, a 33-year-old employee of a college access nonprofit, who voted for Mamdani, said that “birds of a feather flock together.”

“I believe the indicators were already in place. I believe that Cuomo simply wouldn’t be open about it because all those who were funding Trump’s campaign were also doing it, he said.

Trump’s endorsement, in the opinion of some, was the icing on the cake.

Although Dominique Witter, a healthcare tech consultant, applauded Cuomo’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic in the city, he had gradually shifted to Mamdani.

She didn’t make a decision until the race’s final sprint.

As she prepared to cast her ballot in Mott Haven, she said, “It took me a while to get there, but I’m voting for Mamdani.”

“I’m not going to lie,” Trump’s endorsement was ineffective. Because that’s not what we want, don’t we? she stated.

Edi Rama, the prime minister of Albania, addressed concerns that Russia is preparing for additional conflicts in Europe in an exclusive interview with Al Jazeera. In response to the US’s increasing efforts to end the conflict, he also suggested that the European Union develop a concrete peace plan for Ukraine.