SNAP Benefits Shutdown, Trump In Japan, Hurricane Melissa

Speaker 1 Wow, 40 million Americans could lose food benefits this weekend.

Speaker 2 The Trump administration says SNAP funding has run out and it will not tap emergency funds to keep the aid going.

Speaker 1 I'm Steve Inskeep with Michelle Martin and this is up first from NPR News.

Speaker 1 The president signed a deal with Japan's new prime minister about rare earth minerals, which go into everything from cell phones to fighter jets to cars.

Speaker 1 It's a bargaining chip ahead of Trump's meeting with China's president.

Speaker 2 And officials in Jamaica issued mandatory evacuation orders in some areas as one of the strongest hurricanes on record heads toward the Caribbean islands.

Speaker 1 Get to Aigron as quickly as possible.

Speaker 2 Hurricane Melissa is traveling slowly but has 175 mile per hour winds. Stay with us.
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Speaker 2 More than 48 million Americans will soon be without federal food assistance.

Speaker 1 The Trump administration says there is no money for SNAP benefits starting November 1st, which is coming right up. And the U.S.

Speaker 1 Department of Agriculture says it will not use emergency funds to change that.

Speaker 2 And Pair Stephen Fowler is here to help explain how food benefits for low-income Americans are now being pulled into a political pressure campaign during the government shutdown.

Speaker 2 Stephen, good morning. Good morning.
So, who gets SNAP benefits and why are they going away this weekend?

Speaker 5 Well, Michelle, one in eight Americans receive SNAP benefits. Many of them are children, senior citizens, and low-income working families.
The U.S.

Speaker 5 Department of Agriculture says, quote, the well has run dry because of the government shutdown. SNAP benefits are mandated by law, but the funds come from annual appropriations.

Speaker 5 Since Congress didn't pass a spending plan for the fiscal year that started October 1st, there are no appropriations to cover the roughly $8 billion a month that it takes to handle SNAP benefits.

Speaker 5 Now, under the hood, when Congress does pass a budget, federal agencies are given Treasury accounts where money is available for a certain period of time to be spent.

Speaker 5 The account where SNAP benefits would come from this fiscal year doesn't exist yet and has no money to be put inside of it.

Speaker 5 But there's a little under $6 billion in contingency fund accounts that some budget experts tell NPR should be used to fund benefits. The Trump administration disagrees.

Speaker 2 How come?

Speaker 5 Well, there's this memo released Friday by the USDA that argues it's actually illegal to use these contingency funds to pay for benefits.

Speaker 5 Right now, the administration claims that the emergency money is only able to be used as a supplement when there's regularly appropriated funds, which, because of the shutdown, there are not.

Speaker 5 Those budget experts I spoke with also point to the funding bills that created the contingency funds intended for use as necessary to, quote, carry out program operations.

Speaker 2 So, this would seem like this is a matter of interpretation.

Speaker 2 But you know, Stephen, this month we've seen the White House find money to pay active duty military members and to tout tariff transfers to extend coverage of WIC.

Speaker 2 That's nutrition assistance that serves low-income women, infants, and children. Why is this different?

Speaker 5 We know the USDA's initial plan for the shutdown mentioned the contingency funds as an option and indicated that Congress intended for SNAP's operations to continue in a shutdown.

Speaker 5 That plan has been removed from their website.

Speaker 5 As for WIC, if you look at federal budget documents, you can see the $300 million that has been transferred to that program from a child nutrition account funded by a portion of last year's tariff revenues.

Speaker 5 The USDA says further transfers to cover SNAP would jeopardize other nutrition programs like school meals.

Speaker 5 I also looked into the federal government's budget data and found that just like SNAP, there aren't actually Treasury accounts that exist that allow the military to get paid this fiscal year.

Speaker 5 But the Trump administration chose to make those payments and say that unused research funds were close enough in purpose to make it work.

Speaker 2 You know, it would seem that there have been a lot of choices made during this shutdown that are aimed at putting pressure on Democrats to reopen the government. Is this one of them?

Speaker 5 Well, the USDA website blames Democrats for the shutdown and for no more snap funds. Same with the memo outlining why the administration won't use those contingency funds.

Speaker 5 This month, the White House has tried to fire workers and slash spending to what it calls, quote, Democrat programs that targets policies Democrats tend to support in areas Democrats tend to live.

Speaker 5 down or not though, Michelle, that's been the Trump administration's goal this whole year, punishing Democrats and restructuring the government.

Speaker 2 Okay, that is NPR Stephen Fowler. Stephen, thank you.

Speaker 5 Thank you.

Speaker 2 Just a few hours ago, President Trump addressed U.S. troops while visiting Japan.

Speaker 1 And on behalf of all Americans, I just want to say, and I came over to say it loud and clear, thank you very much. Thank you.
Thank you.

Speaker 1 The president was also notably friendly toward the country that has hosted American troops since 1945.

Speaker 1 It is part of Trump's brand to disparage longtime allies from Canada to Germany and beyond, but he sounded different in Tokyo, where the two countries announced friendly gestures on everything from rare earth minerals to their stance on China to cherry trees.

Speaker 2 White House correspondent Deepa Shivram is traveling with the President, and she's with us now to tell us more about the show. Good morning, Deeper.
I guess good afternoon where you are.

Speaker 6 Well, yep, good evening.

Speaker 2 Good evening. Okay, so how did Trump talk about Japan?

Speaker 6 Yeah, it was really interesting.

Speaker 6 I mean, he, even just in the days leading up to this Asia trip, was telling reporters that he was really looking forward to meeting the Japanese prime minister, Sanai Takayichi.

Speaker 6 She was recently elected. She's the country's first female prime minister.

Speaker 6 And she and Trump kind of share a little bit of common ground because both the president and prime minister were close with the former Japanese prime minister Shinzo Abe.

Speaker 6 So Trump was really kind of building this meeting up. They spoke over the phone, even just on the way, Trump traveling to Asia.

Speaker 6 So, they had spoken before, but this was the first day that they had met.

Speaker 6 And today, when he was addressing the troops in Japan, he actually brought the Prime Minister up on stage to make her own remarks.

Speaker 6 So, yeah, the two of them really were getting along, and that sort of was reciprocated in many ways.

Speaker 6 One of them being that the White House announced earlier today that the Prime Minister nominated Trump for a Nobel Peace Prize.

Speaker 2 So, what else was discussed in that meeting?

Speaker 6 Yeah, they covered a lot of different topics. Japan and the U.S.
signed an agreement on rare earths minerals, and they also discussed the Russia-Ukraine war.

Speaker 6 They also signed an agreement that essentially says the U.S. and Japan are in a, quote, golden age of their alliance.

Speaker 6 Like I said, the leaders seem to be getting along really well, and that translates to the country's relationship.

Speaker 6 Both the prime minister and the president were actually both late coming into the meeting, and they apologized to reporters because they were watching the third game of the World Series together.

Speaker 6 And Trump said in his remarks, you know, anything that Japan needed, the U.S. would be there for.

Speaker 1 Anything I can do to help Japan, we will be there. We are an ally at the strongest level.

Speaker 6 And, you know, Michelle, just to put this into context, especially when it comes to trade, there is a framework for a U.S.-Japan trade deal that was agreed to earlier this year, and that's a 15% tariff on Japan's exports.

Speaker 6 And it also includes Japan investing $550 billion in the U.S. It is possible that some of that could be renegotiated.

Speaker 6 But in the meantime, on top of that, Japan has also recently purchased more military equipment from the U.S.,

Speaker 6 is considering buying Ford F-150 trucks from the U.S. as well.
And they announced today in the meeting that in honor of America's 250th birthday next year, Japan's gifting the U.S.

Speaker 6 250 new cherry trees to DC, which of course has the famous cherry blossom trees around the tidal basin that are from Japan.

Speaker 2 So the president heads to Korea next. What's on deck for that stop?

Speaker 6 Right. So that's tomorrow's trip.
He's heading to Korea. The big event there is going to be his meeting with Chinese leader Xi Jinping on Thursday.

Speaker 6 A lot of up and downs in the trade negotiations that are still being worked out.

Speaker 6 But even before that, Trump is going to meet with Korea's President Lee, and the trade deal with South Korea isn't finalized. There's negotiations still going on.

Speaker 6 Treasury Secretary Scott Besson said that a deal is not likely to come out of the meeting this week, and there's just ongoing discussions with that.

Speaker 2 That is M. Pris Deepa Shivram, traveling with the President in Tokyo.
Deepa, thank you.

Speaker 6 Thank you.

Speaker 2 Jamaica is bracing for a category five hurricane that is expected to make landfall this morning.

Speaker 1 Hurricane Melissa is the strongest hurricane ever to hit the island and its winds are starting to build there.

Speaker 2 And Pierre's Ada Peralta is following the story from Mexico City. Good morning to you, Ader.

Speaker 1 Hey, good morning.

Speaker 2 So where are we expecting this hurricane to come onshore?

Speaker 7 Look, last night, Hurricane Melissa essentially paused for a few hours.

Speaker 7 It wasn't moving very much, but now it has made a northeasterly turn, and in the next few hours, it will pummel Jamaica's southeastern coast.

Speaker 7 This is a monster storm, and that's not an overstatement.

Speaker 7 The National Hurricane Center says it has wind gusts of 175 miles per hour, making it one of the strongest storms ever recorded in the Atlantic basin.

Speaker 7 And it will become the strongest storm in recorded history to make landfall in Jamaica. For Jamaica, this only compares to Hurricane Gilbert, which made landfall as a category four in 1988.

Speaker 2 In Jamaica, do we know anything about the damage so far, even with the storm still off the coast?

Speaker 7 Yeah, the strongest winds are not yet on shore. And it has been a long wait because this hurricane has been meandering just off the coast since last week.

Speaker 7 Last night, as the winds were picking up, our producer in Kingston spoke to Aximo Smith, who was watching waves from a pier.

Speaker 7 And he said what worried him immediately is that they had waited so long for this storm that they had already begun digging digging into their emergency supplies.

Speaker 8 Our emergency supplies are almost finished. Some actually finished already.
So, hope for the best ready.

Speaker 7 Look, this is a serious storm, as serious as it gets. The whole island, which has a population of around 3 million, will be pummeled.
And forecasters say we should expect catastrophic damage.

Speaker 7 Winds of that speed will cause total structural failure, and they're going to cause severe damage to the infrastructure.

Speaker 7 Not only that, but the coastal areas will get a huge storm surge of up to 13 feet. And we should note that three people have already died during the preparation stage of the storm.

Speaker 7 All three were killed by accidents involving the trimming of trees.

Speaker 2 What has the government said about recovery?

Speaker 7 I mean, the government says that it is ready. They say that crews will be immediately clearing roads and trying to get the power back on.

Speaker 7 And they say they're ready to begin distributing aid as soon as this storm passes. But last night, government officials said they were worried because few Jamaicans had actually sought shelter.

Speaker 7 The winds were already picking up, and officials said that out of the 881 shelters, only 133 of them had people in them. So a lot of them were completely empty.

Speaker 7 Government officials were out last night trying to convince people to evacuate before the winds got too strong.

Speaker 7 Local government minister Desmond Mackenzie warned that many parishes were about to get hit very hard.

Speaker 1 And I want to urge persons in these parishes

Speaker 1 to get to Aygrown as quickly as possible.

Speaker 7 So he's saying get to higher ground away from the coast. And as this storm approaches, it makes you wonder how many of these people in lower elevations it makes you wonder how they will fare.

Speaker 2 That is, and Paris Ada Peralta, he's reporting from Mexico City. Ader, thank you.

Speaker 7 Thank you, Michelle.

Speaker 2 If you're just waking up on the East Coast, you barely missed the ending of one of the greatest World Series games we've ever seen or read about since I was already asleep.

Speaker 1 There you go, exactly. Game three, the L.A.
Dodgers against the Toronto Blue Jays, and the Dodgers won in the 18th inning. Yes, the 18th inning.
Double-time game. It ran more than six hours.

Speaker 1 It ties for the longest World Series game ever.

Speaker 2 And that other game, also the Dodgers, back in 2018, that game ended with a walk-off home run in the 18th, and history repeated itself when slugger Freddie Freeman hit this bomb.

Speaker 2 Here is the call on Fox Sports.

Speaker 6 Freeman sends a flyball to center field. Marshall's going back before the clock strikes midnight.
Freddie Freeman has ended it.

Speaker 1 Okay, so the Dodgers are up two games to one, and now after a mere 15 hours of rest, The two teams will meet again for game four of the World Series at 8 o'clock Eastern tonight.

Speaker 2 And that's Up First for Tuesday, October 28th. I'm Michelle Martin.

Speaker 1 And I'm Steve Inskeep. Up First gets you caught up, and Morning Edition takes you deeper.

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Speaker 2 Today's episode of Up First was edited by Dana Farrington, Padma Rama, Tara Neal, Mohamed El-Bardisi, and Alice Wolfley. It was produced by Ziad Buch, Nia Dumas, and Christopher Thomas.

Speaker 2 We get engineering support from Damien Herring Nathan and our technical director is Carly Strange. We hope you'll join us again tomorrow.

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