Puerto Rico’s Nutrition Crisis: A Looming Humanitarian Disaster

By Dr. Wil Rodríguez

TOCSIN Magazine

As the clock ticks toward November 1st, over one million Puerto Ricans face an unprecedented threat: the complete shutdown of their only lifeline to food security. The Nutrition Assistance Program (NAP), which feeds nearly half of the island’s impoverished population, stands on the precipice of collapse—not due to natural disaster, not due to economic downturn, but due to federal government dysfunction and a calculated decision to treat Puerto Rico as expendable.

The Perfect Storm

The federal government shutdown, triggered by Congress’s failure to pass essential budget appropriations before the fiscal year ended on September 30, 2025, has created a catastrophic scenario. Unlike the mainland’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which has operated continuously since the Great Depression, Puerto Rico’s NAP now faces complete defunding within days.

On October 24, 2025, the USDA announced it would not utilize its $5-6 billion contingency fund to continue regular SNAP benefits during the shutdown. For Puerto Rico, this decision is devastating. The Trump administration has explicitly warned that EBT debit cards will not be reloaded and that the program will run out of money on November 1st—a mere three days away as of this writing.

Second-Class Citizens by Design

This crisis exposes a deeper injustice: Puerto Rico has never been treated equally when it comes to nutritional assistance. Since the Reagan administration’s budget cuts in the 1980s, Puerto Rico was excluded from SNAP and given NAP instead—a capped block grant that automatically reduced aid by 25 percent from the start.

The disparities are staggering. While mainland SNAP recipients in a family of two receive an average of $364 monthly—reaching up to $536 in high-cost states—Puerto Ricans receive a paltry $115 per person. Recipients consistently report their benefits run out by the 25th or 30th of each month, forcing impossible choices between food, medicine, and utilities.

NAP’s structural limitations compound the problem. Unlike SNAP, which automatically expands during economic crises or natural disasters, NAP operates on fixed funding that cannot respond to increased need. When Hurricane Maria devastated the island in 2017, disaster assistance didn’t begin flowing for six months—a delay that would never be tolerated on the mainland.

The Human Cost

Yesterday, Resident Commissioner Pablo José Hernández issued an urgent appeal to Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins, expressing “profound concern for the impact this situation will have on families who depend on NAP to feed themselves.” His words carry the weight of desperation: “Tens of thousands of households in Puerto Rico depend on NAP to buy food. Any delay or reduction in benefits would have immediate and severe consequences for our elderly, our children, and our low-income workers.”

Consider what this means in concrete terms. Over 40 percent of Puerto Rico’s population lives below the poverty line. NAP serves approximately half of them. Within days, these families—already stretching inadequate benefits to last the month—will have nothing. No food stamps. No EBT cards. No safety net.

The island’s elderly will skip meals. Children will go to bed hungry. Working families, already barely surviving, will face impossible choices. And unlike mainland Americans facing the same shutdown, Puerto Ricans have no guarantee their program will resume, no historical precedent of continuous operation to provide reassurance.

Contradictions and Confusion

Adding insult to injury, Puerto Rican government officials have provided contradictory information about NAP funding for November. While federal authorities warn the well is running dry, local officials offer unclear and conflicting assessments of available resources. This confusion itself is telling—it reflects Puerto Rico’s perpetual position of uncertainty and subordination in the federal system.

The contingency fund exists. The money is there—$5-6 billion allocated by Congress specifically for situations like this. The USDA simply chose not to use it. And when that choice impacts Puerto Rico more severely than any state, when it threatens to do what has never been done in American history—completely shut down food assistance during a government closure—the message is unmistakable: Puerto Rican lives matter less.

The Local Response: Too Little, Too Late?

As the crisis escalated, Governor Jenniffer González Colón’s administration scrambled to respond. On October 29th, González assured the public that her government had identified resources to maintain NAP for two weeks, stating: “My government will always seek to give peace and tranquility to all these federal employees and all the people in Puerto Rico who don’t have money to put food on their table.”

But two weeks is not a solution—it’s a band-aid on a hemorrhage. The administration claims it found approximately $50 million in savings from the Department of Family’s management of NAP funds to extend assistance through the first week of November. Beyond that? The plan remains unclear.

The situation grew more complicated when Nelson Albino, the local director of the USDA’s Rural Development office, issued a stark warning on social media about the danger of state governments using their own funds to cover SNAP during the federal shutdown. His message was unequivocal: the federal government will not reimburse states for money spent on food assistance during the shutdown because “the federal government is not obligated to do so.”

This warning puts Puerto Rico in an impossible position. Secretary of Governance Francisco Domenech insisted they’re having “almost daily” conversations with federal Agriculture officials about using state funds with potential reimbursement. But Albino’s public statement contradicts this hope. Puerto Rico, already under the control of a federal fiscal oversight board and operating with severely constrained resources, cannot simply absorb the cost of feeding one million people indefinitely.

Resident Commissioner Pablo José Hernández sent an urgent letter to Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins requesting clarification on whether Puerto Rico would receive reimbursement if it uses state funds to maintain NAP. His letter raises the fundamental question haunting this crisis: “Should Puerto Rican families be left behind simply because the administration refuses to use the legal tools and resources at its disposal?”

The Director of the Office of Management and Budget, Luis Rivera Berríos, defended the administration’s preparedness, noting that Governor González authorized increasing the budget reserve from 2.5% to 5%—approximately $655 million—and that the office maintains $824 million in control reserves to reprogram resources if federal funding risks emerge. Yet these reserves were designed to mitigate risks, not to replace entire federal programs indefinitely.

The administration’s response reveals a deeper problem: Puerto Rico’s government is being forced to choose between fiscal responsibility under federal oversight and feeding its people. It’s a choice no state would ever face.

Legislative Efforts: The Long Game While People Go Hungry

To her credit, Governor González has been working on long-term solutions. In September 2025, she and Resident Commissioner Hernández presented the Puerto Rico Nutrition Assistance Fairness Act to Congress. The bill proposes a structured 10-year transition from NAP to SNAP, designed to implement the change without shocking the federal budget in a five-year window—the main obstacle that has killed previous attempts at reform.

González, who previously served as Resident Commissioner, has a long history of fighting for NAP funding increases and disaster assistance after Hurricanes Irma and María. The current legislation represents perhaps the most viable path forward, with bipartisan support from Senators Kirsten Gillibrand and Richard Blumenthal.

But legislative victories mean nothing to families who won’t eat next week. The transition to SNAP, as González herself acknowledged, “is not like pressing a button; it involves transforming an entire service structure that has operated under different rules for more than 40 years.” It’s the right long-term solution, but it offers no immediate relief.

The irony is bitter: González is simultaneously trying to secure Puerto Rico’s long-term food security through SNAP transition while desperately patching together resources to prevent immediate hunger. She’s playing chess while the house burns down.

A Moral Reckoning

This crisis demands more than emergency appropriations or temporary fixes. It requires a fundamental reckoning with how the United States treats its Caribbean territory. Multiple bills have been introduced in Congress to transition Puerto Rico to SNAP—the Puerto Rico Nutrition Assistance Fairness Act, the Closing the Meal Gap Act—but none have been enacted. The word “fairness” in that first bill’s title speaks volumes: even advocates acknowledge the current system is inherently unfair.

The proposed 2026 budget includes $2.994 billion for NAP, a $72 million increase that sounds generous until you understand it still leaves Puerto Ricans with less than a third of what mainland residents receive. It’s the policy equivalent of offering crumbs and calling it dinner.

Governor González has also implemented immediate humanitarian measures: her administration is paying salaries for employees at El Yunque National Forest and historic forts like El Morro and San Cristóbal to keep these tourist sites open during the shutdown. The Department of Family is conducting service fairs to help federal employees apply for NAP and childcare assistance. These are commendable actions—and they also underscore the absurdity of Puerto Rico having to rescue federal programs and employees with its own limited resources.

The Office of Management and Budget director proudly noted that Puerto Rico’s fiscal 2026 budget “responsibly establishes mechanisms to mitigate federal funding risks.” But should any American territory have to budget for the possibility that the federal government will abandon its commitment to feeding hungry citizens? The fact that Puerto Rico must maintain hundreds of millions in reserves specifically to protect against federal dysfunction is itself an indictment of the system.

As November 1st approaches, we face a stark question: Will the United States allow over one million of its citizens—for Puerto Ricans are American citizens—to go hungry because of bureaucratic gridlock and systemic discrimination? Will we witness the first interruption of nutritional assistance since the Great Depression, and will it happen not to any state, but to a territory that has endured decades of second-class treatment?

The Path Forward

The immediate solution is clear: utilize the contingency fund, ensure NAP continues operating, and pass emergency appropriations. But the long-term solution requires courage—the courage to admit that Puerto Rico deserves equality, that NAP should be replaced with SNAP, and that American citizens in San Juan have the same right to food security as those in San Francisco or Savannah.

Every day we maintain this two-tiered system, we participate in a quiet form of discrimination. Every month we provide inadequate benefits that run out before month’s end, we tell Puerto Rican families their hunger matters less. And now, as we watch the calendar turn toward November 1st with no resolution in sight, we face the ultimate test of our national values.

The question isn’t whether we can afford to treat Puerto Rico equally. The question is whether we can afford not to—morally, ethically, and as a nation that claims to value the dignity of all its people.

The clock is ticking. One million Puerto Ricans are waiting. And the world is watching to see what America will choose.

Reflection Box

Reflection by Dr. Wil Rodríguez

Hunger is not just a matter of food—it is a measure of our collective conscience. Puerto Rico’s crisis exposes not only an economic imbalance but a moral fracture in how we define citizenship, equality, and compassion. When a nation’s bureaucracy forgets its humanity, it is the people’s responsibility to remind it what justice looks like. The time to act is now.

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