could soon have to spend 10's of millions from its own budget to continue serving residents on the supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program or SNAP.

The change comes as part of President Donald Trump's one big beautiful bill which ships a portion of snap costs from the federal government to individual states.

The Trump administration says the change will reduce fraud and waste in the program.

But food access advocates warn it could make it harder for families who rely on snap to get the assistance that they need.

Joining us now are Nolan Downey, senior director of policy at Greater Chicago Food Depository.

And Natalie Morehead, Snap recipient and Englewood resident.

Thanks for joining us to both.

Nolen Breakdown.

This policy change for us, please.

What is it that states now being required to pay or could be required to pay?

as you mentioned, this is yet another consequence that flows from the federal reconciliation bill, the so-called one big beautiful bill that passed last summer.

>> This bill contained historic, unprecedented cuts to social safety net programs like snap programs like Medicaid.

We already have confronted in the state.

Thousands of people losing benefits because of some provisions in that bill.

Cool and ineffective work requirements.

Harsh restrictions for lawfully present humanitarian immigrants and now states across the country are grappling with the next a very significant change that was made to the program, which is a portion of SNAP benefits could be shifted for the first time ever.

2 states from the federal government snap has always been 100% federally funded now states across the country are beginning to have to grapple with what could be hundreds of millions, even billions in some states if they don't pay those bills, we they will lose the snap program.

And so that is what we're facing Illinois.

The total loss of the program break.

And that shift is based on on error rates and percentage of errors at the state makes and either over or under paying.

>> Its recipients.

And according to the list from the USDA, Food and Nutrition Administration program, Illinois's in the top 5, it's the 5th actually with a an error rate of about 14.67%, which will come back to in a little bit.

But Natalie, I want to get you in here.

You are a single mom of 3.

You rely heavily on the snap program to take care of yourself and your family, how it cuts to snap and some of the changes to snap in the big beautiful bill impacted you your family.

And it's been tremendously scary and I'm certain time and my family well as other families in my community that heavily rely on these benefits.

>> And a lot of us are working parents.

So it's not like we're just sitting at home waiting on these It relying on them.

It's been kind of uncertain and with everything going on in the constant changes, uncertain by the day.

So the anxiety and fear grows daily.

>> great.

And you you work part-time, correct?

Reading that OK?

And of course, that was one of the you mentioned Nolan, of course, that the work requirements.

And then of course, there's the the added, you know, sort a I guess, requirement that you also have to show that you're working a certain number of hours or volunteering in order to continue receiving your benefits as well.

>> Yeah, that has been kind of hectic because I have a disabled might disabled.

And trying to maintain the schedule where I can provide money to pay my bills and be there for my children with these new requirements.

making it almost impossible.

And it's forcing parents like myself and other families to make these these hard decisions on we're going to work or are we going lose our benefit?

You know, what are we gonna do?

You know?

No one.

The Department of Agriculture, as we mentioned, says that Illinois has a 13.3% over payment error rate.

And a 1.3, 3% under payment error rate.

>> What those numbers mean her.

They calculated.

Yeah.

I mean, in the simplest possible terms, you really nailed it.

The payment error rate is very simply just a measure of whether people on staff are paid the right amount.

>> Now, snap like income based programs, other income based programs.

There are a multitude of financial and non-financial factors that impact people's eligibility and the amount of benefits that they get.

Any small discrepancy between a number of those factors could impact their benefit amount and create an air.

Somebody picks up an extra shift at work and doesn't report additional income.

Somebody reports their rent and their utilities together instead of separately like they're supposed on a program rules.

There are a lot of things that folks can do that are overwhelmingly innocent, unintentional mistakes that nonetheless could create these errors.

I think we need to push back forcefully on the federal narrative that these are result of fraud fought in the SNAP program is overwhelmingly low.

0.1% of households in Illinois, according to the last recent data that I saw have been investigated, not found guilty of but investigated for fraud.

Fog is not meaningfully exists in the program.

And so any proposition that this is a program that is is rife with fraud is just simply not true.

>> Natalie, what is it?

You know, what does it mean to you?

What do you hear?

What does it feel like when you hear that, you know, all these problems potential, you know, massive millions of dollars in payments at the state is going have to make.

Was that need to you?

it comes down to these numbers it's very disheartening for me.

And it's discouraging as well because it it leaves families like myself to figure out.

>> How we're going to survive.

And we're working the best that we can.

And we're doing the most that we can with this situation hearing that we're reduced to numbers.

It's very I want to say.

Kinda.

Inhumane.

It makes us feel less than and it definitely definitely takes away from assist people who receive these benefits hearing that we're just reduced to a number or categorized by mistakes that the system has made.

You know, makes me feel disheartened.

Berry.

Very discomforting.

Nolan, how much could Illinois into paying for snap and wind back Yeah.

So in future years, we're now looking at October 2028, when this bill could become do.

We're talking about up to 700 million dollars.

>> That is money again, that if we do not pay that we lose the program entirely.

that is not an option.

We're going to do everything that we can to reverse these unjust, unfair cuts at the federal level in their entirety.

We want everything that was done in the so-called one big beautiful bill reversed.

But until that goal is achieved, the state need to prepare now to absorb this financial cost.

Because if we don't do that, we lose entire program.

And again, that is just simply not an option that 700 million dollars.

That is a portion of of what it costs already.

Correct.

That's not penalties or fines.

Know that 700 million dollars, which is about 15% of all the benefits that flow into the state.

So that 700 million we're paying that in order to preserve a 4 billion dollar program that serves about 1.7 million people in the state.

So critical program that, you this this arrangement is unjust.

But until we reverse that, we've got to prepare preserve the program in the