A legal fight over which groceries older Americans and other households can buy with Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits has moved from a district courtroom to a federal appeals court, and the stakes have grown well beyond the five states directly named in the lawsuit. The U.S. Department of Agriculture is asking the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to overturn a ruling that struck down its approval of state waivers restricting soda and candy purchases. Legal analysts tracking the case say however the appellate judges rule, the decision could shape whether any state, not just the five involved in the original suit, has the legal footing to limit what SNAP dollars can buy.
USDA’s Notice of Appeal to the D.C. Circuit
The agency filed its notice of appeal on Aug. 20, formally asking the D.C. Circuit to review U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson’s June 22 summary judgment against waivers USDA had approved for Colorado, Iowa, Nebraska, Tennessee and West Virginia. Jackson had found that USDA lacked the statutory authority to exempt soda, candy and similar items from SNAP’s federal definition of “food,” and that the agency skipped a required public notice period before letting the state pilot programs begin. She also found that USDA had leaned on a section of law meant to “increase SNAP efficiency” rather than the stricter, more specific pilot-project authority Congress actually built for this kind of program change, a distinction the D.C. Circuit will now have to weigh on its own.
Filing the notice starts the clock on a review process that typically takes many months. Briefing schedules for cases like this one, involving cross-cutting statutory interpretation questions and multiple state governments with an interest in the outcome, often stretch well into the following year before a three-judge panel issues a decision, and a further request for rehearing or Supreme Court review could push final resolution out even longer.
Importantly, the appeal itself changes nothing about current SNAP rules; as reported by Feedstuffs, the five vacated waivers stay blocked unless the D.C. Circuit reverses the district court or grants USDA a stay while the case proceeds. What the appeal does is put USDA’s underlying legal theory back in front of judges, this time ones whose ruling could apply well beyond the five states that sued.
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Why the Case Could Reach Beyond the Five States Involved
USDA has approved more than 20 SNAP food-restriction waivers since January 2025, and every one of them, including the 18 that remain active in states such as Idaho, Florida and Arkansas, relied on the same section of federal law that Jackson found insufficient for Colorado, Iowa, Nebraska, Tennessee and West Virginia. The Food Research & Action Center, a nonprofit focused on hunger policy, wrote that while Jackson’s order technically applies only to the five named states, her reasoning about USDA’s statutory limits “may provide a roadmap for future challenges” to every other state’s waiver, according to the group’s analysis of the ruling. That means the D.C. Circuit’s eventual decision carries weight far past the litigants in this specific case.
If the appeals court affirms Jackson’s reasoning, states with active waivers would not be automatically stripped of them, since each remains in effect unless USDA withdraws it or a separate lawsuit succeeds against it individually. But an affirmance would hand plaintiffs in those other 18 states a tested legal blueprint, built on the same “food” definition argument that already worked once. If the D.C. Circuit instead sides with USDA, it would validate the broader legal theory the agency has used to expand these waivers over the past year and a half, likely encouraging more states to seek similar restrictions on their own SNAP populations.
What the Outcome Means for Household Grocery Budgets
For SNAP households, and older adults and people with disabilities make up a substantial share of that caseload, the practical question is whether grocery shopping rules will stay uniform nationwide or continue splintering state by state. A ruling that favors USDA’s authority to approve broad restriction pilots would make it more likely that additional states adopt their own limits on sugary drinks, energy drinks and candy, potentially narrowing what a fixed-income shopper can buy depending on which state they happen to live in. A ruling that goes the other way would put every current waiver, not just the five already vacated, on shakier legal ground, and could eventually restore uniform national purchasing rules across all states that currently restrict certain items.
Because appellate review of this kind rarely resolves quickly, households in the 18 states with active waivers should expect their current restrictions to remain in force for the foreseeable future, while those in the five states covered by Jackson’s order should expect the current, unrestricted rules to hold unless USDA secures a stay. The USDA Food and Nutrition Service’s waiver tracker remains the most current public record of which states are actively restricting purchases at any given time, and it is worth checking directly rather than relying on secondhand counts that can go stale within weeks as the litigation moves forward.
This article was produced with the assistance of AI and reviewed by The Financial Wire editorial team.
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David M. Keller is a finance writer based in Columbus, Ohio, covering personal finance and consumer-focused economic topics. He earned his degree in journalism from Ohio University and began his career reporting on local business and economic trends for a regional media outlet. Since then, he has contributed to a variety of online publications, focusing on clear, practical coverage of topics such as cost of living, debt, and everyday financial decision-making.
