Nearly $5 million in Washington emergency food assistance is canceled by USDA, including over $400K for Spokane

The Trump Administration on Tuesday canceled nearly $5 million in emergency food assistance for the state of Washington.

For the next few months, foods like chicken and turkey breasts, canned chicken, dried plums, dried cranberries and milk will no longer be provided by the federal emergency food program for food banks in Washington, according to Daniel Schafer, the communications administrator for the Washington Department of Agriculture.

Employees at the state’s agriculture department logged into a federal system to track orders for food assistance programs on Tuesday and noticed the status of a previous order for food delivery from April to June changed from “under review” to “canceled.” Those orders total $4.7 million as part of the Emergency Food Assistance Program, run by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

In Spokane County, that equates to a cancellation of around $405,000 in federal food dollars, or 8.6% of the total reduction.

The cuts roll out in tandem with the Trump Administration’s efforts to slash more than $1 billion in programs that helped food banks, schools and low-income families afford standard meals – the cost of food, however, continues to rise, and more families are seeking assistance from local food banks, says Eric Williams, the spokesperson for Second Harvest.

The Spokane County hunger-relief network serves 26 counties across Eastern Washington and parts of North Idaho.

Because Second Harvest’s federal food is a small portion – around 5% of its total 35 million pounds in food distributions a year – it’s likely the center will be able to supplement that loss, Williams said. But there’s little clarity around the federal decision to cut those deliveries, and “it changes by the hour for everybody here,” he said. Second Harvest is continuing to seek clarity on the matter, but the information the center gets depends largely on the state, which depends on USDA, Williams said.

“Any changes have an impact. The important part is what effect it will have on families,” he added. “But, if we aren’t getting (emergency assistance) milk, that doesn’t mean we can’t get milk elsewhere. There’s a mosaic of sources, and its always changing. It could change tomorrow.”

Williams said as of Wednesday government food cancellations to Second Harvest include items like canned summer corn, canned green beans, 2% milk, oranges and cranberries.

The canceled orders from Tuesday aren’t the first loss to food programs since the Trump administration took office. On March 7, the state’s agriculture department received a notice from the federal government that $8.5 million in Local Food Purchase Assistance funding was terminated, Schafer said.

That program provides funding for tribal and state governments to purchase food within 400 miles of their delivery destination, USDA’s website says. The purpose, according to USDA, is to “maintain and improve food and agricultural supply chain resiliency” and allows states and tribes to “procure and distribute local and regional foods and beverages that are healthy, nutritious, unique to their geographic areas and that meet the needs of the population.”

The spending for the purchase assistance program was expected to be available into next year, Schafer said. Not anymore.

In February, there was some indication of potential changes to food assistance in a status report from USDA, which told Washington’s agriculture department that an order was “returned for review.” That means the orders were in the process to be completed, but that process was stopped, Schafer said.

When Washington turned to USDA for clarity, “they were not able to provide any additional information other than that these orders were under review,” Schafer said. At present, how Washington would supplement the loss of $4.7 million in emergency food is up in the air.

“We are going to do the best we can, no matter what the situation is,” Schafer said.

At the same time, Washington still has food coming in from nonfederal sources and is accepting food that other states may have turned down, said Kim Eads, the food assistance program manager for Washington’s agriculture department.

At Second Harvest, the distribution has been “level” over the last four years, Williams said, but the need has skyrocketed because more working families are using food banks. More than 50 million people went to food banks for help in 2023, according to a survey from Feeding America. While a majority of Second Harvest’s food is privately donated, the portion of government-funded or delivered food also increased slightly in 2024, Williams said. Those numbers fluctuate often.

Co-executive director for Serve Spokane Cathy DelPizzo said Wednesday her food pantry obtains 50-70% of its food from Second Harvest, but she’s unsure how much of that is government-funded. As of Tuesday, she hadn’t heard of any direct impacts to the food pantry. If Serve Spokane, which is faith-based, is later affected by the government cuts, its people would “put the word out” and ask for donations, DelPizzo said. But there are “always ways we see God put food on our shelves.”

Since 2007, the food pantry has been through its fair share of ups and downs. There was an instance when Serve Spokane had no money and no meat, DelPizzo said, and then a meat processing plant had a buyer cancel an order.

“They literally delivered pallets full of meat to us,” DelPizzo said. “We have seen the community be responsive, and Spokane is pretty amazing. People do care about other people.”

In the meantime, DelPizzo said the number of people seeking assistance from her pantry has more than doubled in the last year with how expensive food is becoming. Prices for all food are predicted to increase 3.2% this year, according to data from the USDA, and grocery store purchases are now 1.9% higher than this time in 2024.

It’s why DelPizzo noticed people showing up at the pantry who usually don’t.

“The school teacher is coming through, who has to supplement for her kids. This man driving this beautiful truck came in, numbers were down in the business he worked for and he was laid off,” she said. “They all said, ‘I’d never thought I’d be coming to a food bank.’ ”