Hello, and welcome to the Texas Tribune trip cast for Tuesday, November fourth.

It is election day, and I am Matthew Watkins, editor in chief of the Texas Tribune, joined as usual by law and politics reporter Eleanor Klippenoff.

Nailed it, nailed it.

This time, nailed on the first try.

Happy Election Day.

Happy election.

Have you voted yet?

I have not.

Actually, I will be voting this afternoon.

Gat you got any like zany election day predictions for us?

Oh?

No, I think I think it's gonna be very low turnout and very predictable outcomes.

But I voted this morning and the vibes were good.

So here's here's my one wild prediction.

SD nine Texas Senate race Kelly Hencock, who you know became comptroller.

Three candidates in the race, two Republicans and Democrats.

I predict that the Democrat will be the leading vote kidder.

What, Yes, it's a Trump plus seventeen district.

Do you want to put money on that too?

Credible?

No?

I don't.

I don't believe in it that much.

But you know, I'm trying to bring some excitement to the podcast.

Two credible Republicans on the ballot that I think the Democrat gets around forty percent in the other two and it creates this whole thing, like people on Twitter will.

Be like, look what's happening in Texas and.

It will mean nothing in the Republican who advances to the runoff will cruise to the actual seat.

That's my prediction.

I think I think you we should bet right now.

We don't put money on it, uh huh, but if we have an upcoming live trip cast happening at Tripfest with Formerhouse Speaker Dade Feelin, you can still get.

To a strip fest if you haven't.

Yeah, I think that if you are.

However it goes, you have to announce the outcome at that event and either eat crow or I will ecrow.

That sounds good.

I'm ready for that.

It's pretty low stakes, but yeah, exactly.

Maybe we'll come up with something better between than and now that.

Yeah, I like it.

I'll shame you quite public are all right?

Cool?

Yeah, But that's not what we're going to talk about today, because, in addition to election Day, today also marks day thirty five of the federal government shutdown.

For the first month or so of the shutdown, it has seemed mainly remarkable for how much the general public and politicians don't really seem to care that much.

They've just sort of continued on with their daily lives.

Negotiations maybe not even really that happening, at least in the public eye.

But you know, of course, two hundred and eighteen thousand federal workers in Texas have been furloughed or working without pay, and this week it really feels like the pain of the shutdown is starting to hit Texas.

For the neatest Texans, that has meant Snap benefits.

There are three point four million Texans in the state who receive SNAP benefits to help pay for food.

Those have been halted, perhaps temporarily.

We'll get into that here in a little bit.

And then, you know, for our more upwardly mobile Texans, it's been the airports being disastrous, our long waits at TCA, t SA, there have been, you know, talks of maybe even further airline disruptions in the coming weeks.

We're going to talk about this with two Texas Tribune reporters.

First of all, health reporter Terry Linkford.

Hello, Terry, Hey.

There have you voted yet?

I voted last week?

Wow, do you have any Zany predictions.

I have no Zanny predictions.

It's Texas.

Why would you predict?

You've written a lot about the dementia prevention proposition that is correct, a Prop fourteen Prop fourteen YEP, that is correct.

A priority of Lieutenant Governor Dan Patrick Patrick.

And also waiting patients Lee for US is our Washington correspondent Gabby Beerenbaum.

Hello, Gabby, have you voted?

Is there anything to vote on?

In DC?

Nothing to vote on?

My parents in Virginia did call me to ask why their congressman wasn't on the ballot, and I had to explain off your elections versus midterms, big governor's race in Virginia.

But that was the extent of my political participation today.

NICs excellent.

Okay, Well let's start with SNAP because it feels to me like the most impactful thing that's happening with this shutdown.

Terry, I want you to just sort of start by giving us the sort of lay of the land of SNAP in Texas, Like, who receives it?

What do they receive all that?

Well, SNAP is a federal program.

It brings seven to eight billion dollars to needy Texans each year.

These are federal dollars that are passed through by the Health and Human Services Commission, which issues it on a lone Star car card, which is sort of a debit card that folks use in a grocery store.

It is a supplement.

So on average, the average allotment is around four hundred dollars.

But for a lot of people who wait for that allotment to hit their lone Star cards to start grocery shopping, they're in limbo right now.

Basically, starting on November one, folks who would have been receiving allotments to help pay for groceries, including you know, over a million children in the state, have not been receiving that those funds.

That is correct.

It takes like a three day turnaround to turn it off or turn it on.

And on the twenty seventh, Snap users were or lone Star card users in Texas were notified that it would not be coming November first.

Now, the thing is is.

That all three points you know, all three point five I've a million Texans don't receive this on one day.

It's distributed through the month, so everyone has a certain day where it hits their account.

Also, if there's any unused benefits they can roll over, so some people have been saving.

According to grocery retailers, they say that not all have been spent according to their accounts.

So some people the minute they were notified around October seventeenth that this could be a possibility, a lot of them started stopping spending their snap But that's not a lot.

You know, at the end of a month, as we all know, our grocery money kind of evaporates waiting for that next paycheck, right, so people are waiting for this money, and Trump just announced that he doesn't want to renew it until after the shutdown ends.

And I mean this is like, I mean commonly, like we think of his food stamps, right, this has been a program for sixty years.

It has been entirely uninterrupted for sixty years.

This is actually it goes back to the thirties, but the formal one that we know as food stamps is going back to the LBJ era.

That's correct, and it's never been interrupted ever.

So because I think, you know, I don't know, like every couple of years we have a shutdown and everyone thinks, oh right, the TSA doesn't get paid and whatever.

But this is pretty exceptional that snap is now falling through the.

Crack it is.

And as Gabby has pointed out, the last longest shutdown, snap money was kind of negotiated as part of the deal that it would proceed despite the shutdown, ahead of the shutdown, right, Gabby, I mean yeah, they.

Sort of they had an account that they were like, all right, we can draw on this in case of an emergency like a shutdown, and then that shutdown.

This is the twenty eighteen twenty nineteen one was also weird because I went from the middle of one month to the middle of another month, whereas this one started, you know, on October first, and we're now passing no member first.

I see.

And so what's different this time?

Why is it?

Is this essentially just a leverage play by the president to try to bring Democrats back to the table.

Why what I think.

Both parties right are looking at, you know, what's what pain points can be avoided and sort of what are the political you know, benefit to each And so for example, right like the Trump administration sort of found a pot of money to pay to make sure that the military didn't miss their first paycheck in the middle of October, and so there's sort of varying legal theories about you know, what accounts you can draw and to pay for what, and what money can be used for what, And we're seeing these things sort of get adjudicated in the courts in real time.

And then obviously there's the court ruling, and then you know, we'll see with the Trump administration how exactly they interpret the court ruling and how long they can sort of stand off in that sense.

But I think, yeah, as as the shutdown drags on, like you mentioned, it's getting more painful, and it seems like it's dragging at least sort of rank and file members to the negotiating table here in DC.

But yeah, a lot rides onto how the White House and how these agencies are interpreting, you know, various accounts and what they can.

And can't be used for.

Yeah, the problem with recording a podcast in twenty twenty five is that by the time you're done recording the podcast, things have changed.

But Terry, can you give us just a you know, a brief update as to where we stand.

There was a lawsuit that was brought by a couple of states to try to force the federal government to pay out for food stamps.

Where are we with that lawsuit?

So there were two states that two rulings, correct me if I'm wrong here, Gabby, but there were two actions by two different judges, both in Boston and in New Hampshire, and they both ruled that they couldn't that SNAP couldn't be interrupted.

USDA, which administers the food stamp or stamp program, said yesterday that they were going to work towards partial payment of benefits for this month, But just a few minutes ago President and Trump said on True Social that he is not going to let stamp money go until after the until the shutdown in So there's a lot of confusion and everyone's trying to figure out whether the.

Partial will move forward.

The federal government hasn't appealed as far as I know, Gabby has not appealed those two rulings, So we're kind of in limbo waiting to see what happens.

What's your sense of how this is playing out on the ground in Texas?

You know, I follow a lot of Facebook groups involving SNAP recipients.

There's a ton of confusion out there.

Am I going to get my stamp benefits?

Should I reapply?

Is it coming do you know, what do I do?

And what's happening is there's more pressure put on food banks right now.

They are in the midst of helping all these furloughed federal workers in addition to people just in you know, sort of food insectecurity.

So throwing another you know, three million or you know, roughly over a million households onto the back of the food the food banks, it's it's it's an impossible situation for them right now.

Yeah, and this comes on top of the fact that a lot of food banks in Texas and elswhere have already been sort of struggling due to federal cuts that were made earlier in the Trump administration.

This, you know, the second Trump administration.

I mean one thing that I saw, you know, the Texas Department of Agriculture lost access to one hundred and nine million dollar grant that basically bought foods from local farmers and brought them to food banks.

So what we're seeing here is under resource food food banks dealing with, you know, a extremely high spike in demand due to, like you said, federal workers being in trouble, but also now people who are missing out on their on their benefits.

And once again, I mean Texas relies greatly on you know sort of it's you know, pull itself up by its bootstrap mentality and the fact that you know, we rely our safety net is nonprofits essentially, and so when the nonprofits are struggling, you know, where do Texans go.

It's it's a question, you know.

They have gone to governor abbott as have Democratic lawmakers in asking for some sort of state assistance to offset this loss.

So far that's not happening.

We are seeing that in other states, but it's not happening in Texas.

Could I mean, what could the state do?

Obviously this is typically federal funds that go to as passed through the state.

Well what what USDAA has said.

They've kind of issued a sort of line in the sand to the states saying, if you cover snap losses for the month of November, we're not reimbursing you on that.

You're on your own.

Now.

Some Republican governors, notably Louisiana and Virginia have said, well, we're gonna We're going to help out anyway, and they're moving money.

And that's what Texas could do.

It could move money from another agency on an emergency basis using abbots emergency powers, and then next legislative session there would be a supplemental budget bill to kind of reconcile those books.

So I mean that is one.

Option that has not yet happened, that has not happened.

But they are asked.

But Democrats in both the Senate and the House have asked for that well.

And one of the things that people advocating for Abbot to do this, they know, you know, it would cost around six hundred and fourteen million dollars to provide this SEMNTH funds for one month for November.

Texas day point out has over twenty billion dollars, and it's rainy day fund that that you know, could eventually, through the maneuverings that you bring up, essentially access to help cover these costs.

Right, and certainly I think some other you mentioned some other states have just sent money to food banks to shore them up.

I mean, these food banks.

Are not in a position to supplement four hundred dollars per family, you know, per family that gets food stamps on a dime.

But the you know, some are thinking, you know, I know, California has sent emergency funding to food banks several hundred million dollars.

That way we could do the same thing that has not happened.

We will say though Social Safety Nets slash, Big Trip cast Fan HGB has sent some funds.

They've sent five million dollars to food banks.

They have sent it to that, they have sent it to feeding Taxos.

Now that also that was already in the works because of Thanksgiving.

I mean AGB does do this during Thanksgiving.

And you know we have also Paul Cobblers written about the impact to retailers.

You know, people don't.

Just go in and use exactly the amount they have on their lone Star card.

They also shop for other things.

This can impact our grocery stores.

So, yeah, just a couple of facts about SNAP which I'm going to read, but I will credit Terry for providing to us here.

About eleven percent of Texans are on SNAP.

I already mentioned three point five million people in the state.

One point seven million of those are children.

You know, there are areas of the state where that is considerably you know higher though the Star County, in the Rio Grande Valley, forty one percent of the population is on SNAP.

You know, rural areas.

South Texas County is twenty five a quarter of the poplpulation.

So there are areas in the state that are really going to see the you know, are going to suffer because of this.

And then one other data point that you pointed out, forty two percent of Texans Texas SNAP recipients work, you know, this is not just sort.

Of and another percentage of them are children, right, right, Husky child labor laws right, and SNAP has regulations that if you have a child fourteen and under, you are.

Exempt from you know, rules that you need to be working.

And forty two percent of those folks are working.

So it's not that this is like, I think what some older Texans would remember as sort of a welfare check that's pretty much gone away.

SNAP is the biggest, it's one of the biggest nutrition programs.

It it helps keep a family stable, It keeps a family healthy and away from the emergency rooms.

It pays dividends in many other ways.

Okay, okay, Gaby, I want to shift focus now to the airports, which you've been writing a little bit about in recent days.

Tell us how the folks at DFW, Bush, Austin, various other places are feeling the impact of this shutdown.

Yeah, I think for any listeners who have traveled in the past few days, I'm sure I've been experiencing.

There were enormously long lines at tsat at IH in Houston yesterday and over the weekend, three hour long waits to get through.

There was a ground stop yesterday in Austin, and then DFW has just been pretty much every day in the top three in USA airport rankings for delays, and a lot of this is due to staffing shortages because air traffic controllers TSA are not getting paid but are expected to work.

They're increasingly calling and sick, and when you have you know, when they don't hit a certain threshold, they have to necessarily issue delays because they have smaller crews working.

And this has now gotten to a point where just today Secretary Duffy from the Department of Transportation said that if this goes into next week, they might have to shut down certain parts of airspace.

So this is something that members of Congress certainly feel right because they travel more.

Than more than just about any point.

So people often say that something that affects travel is like more likely to move politicians and almost any other issue.

But yeah, I mean I certainly think that's an area and if you you know, I've seen a ton of people complaining this online about the lines and delays and everything, and so I think this is this is certainly another pressure point on Congress right now.

Can you sort of explain, like obviously it's clear from you know, the way President Trump is dougumbout food stamps or this sort of fear of shutting down airspace, like the Republicans certainly are trying to hold on to some of these bargaining chips.

What like, what do the Democrats have in terms of bargaining chips other than just sort of weathering the pain of people being mad about this shutdown.

Yeah, I mean that's kind of why we're here, because one of the democrats only bargaining chips was the fact that you need sixty votes in the Senate for a government funding bill and Republicans have fifty three members.

And so that was I think sort of the pressure for Democrats to not, you know, vote for this funding bill that only funded the government through November twenty first, that they were not included on negotiations and to say, well, this is our one point, we separately want an extension on these ACI tax credit subsidies in healthcare, and this is sort of our leverage point to do it.

And I think at various points Republicans have thought, oh, they're only doing it through whatever date and then you know, the pain points will kick in and it'll become too much.

That first it was they're just getting through the No King's rally, and then it kept going, and then it was, oh.

Well on November first.

You know, once things get more painful, like we're talking about with snap with airports, then they'll cave.

Now the Republicans have been saying, oh, once the elections are through today, then they'll cave.

So I think it's and I think Democrats, you know, want different things.

I think some say at some points has got to end, and you know, we'll come to some sort of spending deal or we'll get a vote on the subsidies.

A lot of the House Democrats are more I think, dug in and say no, we don't just want like a process.

We want an outcome, you know, not just oh we'll have a vote.

We want the vote to pass.

And so I think there's definitely been movement starting last week and into this week that this might end.

But you know.

I certainly the Republicans, I think, did not think that Democrats were going to last this long.

Well, let's you mentioned the healthcare subsidies, which is essentially what Democrats are asking for in this shutdown breakdown kind of what's happening there and why that might have a particular impact on Texans.

Yeah, and so this is this is going to be huge deal.

It's Terry's aren't about as I've written about in Texas because Texas is one of ten states that never expanded Medicaid, and so that means that people who are making above one hundred percent of the federal poverty level are not eligible for Medicaid.

What they are eligible for is these pretty.

Generous tax credits for their premiums if they get healthcare through the Affordable Care Act through the marketplace.

And so Texas has more enrollies in the ACA than all but one state, than all but Florida, another state that didn't expand Medicaid.

And those subsidies which create a sliding scale for people to only pay a certain percent of their income towards their premium and the government pays for the rest that's expiring at the end of the year, and so the size of these subsidies are going to shrink, and as a result, people's premiums, the amount they'll pay towards the premiums will rise, and then also the cost of the underlying premiums expected to rise because insures already pricing in the expiration of these subsidies.

And so this is going to be a huge sort of shock to the to the health insurance system in Texas and something that Democrats have sort of seized on as something they want addressed in exchange for negotiating on government funding.

And I mean, it's really interesting.

We've got two health programs right fighting, you know, a fight to keep two health programs going, the ACA and SNAP.

I've been talking to older Texans who are over the age of fifty but too young for Medicare, and they're getting hit, they're getting clobbered.

They were all receiving their premium prices.

I'm talking to.

A woman in the Beaumont area who is going to see her increase.

You know, she's fifty five, has a job, but no insurance coverage through her employer, and it's going from five hundred and eighty dollars to over one thousand a month.

I mean right, and a lot of a lot of people I assume who work jobs that don't have health insurance may also so if those are low wage jobs, qualify for SNAP.

They're seeing just sort of all of these pinches all at once.

Yeah, compounding problems.

Yeah, absolutely of each other for sure.

And as Gabby you reported last week, right, the average ACA premiums in Texas going up thirty five percent this year.

Yeah, and that's just the underlying premium, right, So the amount people are actually going to pay towards it is going to.

Rise higher than that.

I think there was like an a point early in the Trump administration where like much of what they were targeted this era of the Trump administration, which what they were targeting was Medicaid, you know, programs we haven't expanded, Like the pinch was sort of less apparent for Texas first, and now you know these Texas just by virtual of being such a large state, but also you know some of what makes us Texas, We have a lot of people on these programs and just have like a huge like the human toll of some of these pinches is pretty significant numbers wise, and some of that.

I mean, well, the focus has been on the ACA, I mean contained in the big beautiful bill.

Correct me if I'm wrong again, Gabby, You're the best fact checker there is on this.

You know, we're seeing cuts to Medicaid, right, so we're going to see a decrease if that passes, and so that's going to squeeze textans even more in a state that has not expanded Medicaid.

Yeah, go ahead, Gabby.

Oh yeah, I was just going to say, I think, you know, Texas sort of avoided the most intents of the because it never expanded.

And so what's called the expansion population of people you know making over one hundred percent of the federal poverty level are now going to have work requirements in other states, not in Texas, right, because those.

People don't Medicaid in the first place.

But this is the exact population that you know, people are worried are on ACA and are going to drop ACA because their premiums are getting unaffordable.

So it seems to me like we're in this situation where the you know, the Democrats who who care about these ACA premiums and want the government to do something about it, are shutting down the government down, non essential services, shutting down social welfare programs that you know, many Republicans feel as though we're spending too much money on anyways, and the response from the Republican administration is sort of, don't threaten me with a good time, like.

What, you know.

I mean, I am having a hard time seeing how this is putting enough pressure on the Trump administration to actually bend to Democrats will in this regard.

What am I.

Missing, if anything, on this?

And I mean, are the Democrats you're talking to, particularly once from Texas being confronted by this situation?

I mean, how do they respond to that skepticism when folks raise it?

Yeah, I mean, I think a lot of the Democrats have been desperate for Trump personally to get involved because there's been some reporting out of the White House that the Trump team sort of understands that this ACA Premium tax credit thing might be an issue for them in the midterms, whereas a lot of the you know, Republican members, a lot of them from Texas especially, you know, would would rather see these these subsidies sort of expire and rovert back.

They worry that there's there's too much federal spending on that issue, and so Trump, you know, has been traveling a ton.

He was in Asia.

He came back, I think on Halloween.

But has been mostly content to let Republicans in the House and Senate negotiate this.

And yeah, I mean I think part of the calculus too.

I mean there's a few different political dynamics.

I think the Democrats.

A lot of the polling has shown that, you know, Democrats are you know, seen as better on the shutdown than Republicans, even though like you said, Democrats are the ones that you know, didn't vote for the funding bill.

You know, I think it's sort of political.

The traditional political wisdom is like nobody cares about a twenty twenty five shut down when they go to vote in October November twenty twenty six.

So I think the timing here certainly like means that both parties have incentive to dig in.

But yeah, I mean this is not a true additional administration.

You know.

Russ Vote, the head of the Office of Management Budget was you know, I think, totally fine with the shutdown and has been you know, threatening to lay off more federal employees.

He did lay off some additional federal employees.

And so, yeah, at a certain point, if you're saying which party is going to experience more pain from this, Who takes the blame for things like snap being shut off?

Ultimately, when is it intolerable to either party that the pain that's being inflicted on people from the shutdown.

I think we're kind of getting to that point this week, and it looks like ultimately, you know, find some sort of short term spending deal and we might do this all again in a few weeks.

So remind me how long the twenty eighteen like, because you were saying, this is the second long longest shutdown.

We tied, We tied today thirty five days?

Did it to become the longest?

Yeah?

Yeah, what's that Chinese curse?

You live through interesting times?

Yeah, you live through record setting times?

Yeah yeah, interesting.

Okay, So you you seem to be a little bit optimistic, Gabby, that we might be getting to the point because of like we just talked about all the pain that is being felt this week in particular, that we might be getting closer to to some resolution here.

I mean, is there anything is there anything public that that suggests that too, or is that more of a hunch.

I think it's more of a hunch.

I mean a lot of the again, a lot of the Republican senators have been projecting confidence that this is going to get resolved this week.

They've been wrong in the last few weeks before.

But I think some of the some of the more.

Moderate Democratic senators have said, you know, maybe it's time to look for an off ramp or find an agreement that we can live with.

I think part of the problem is, you know, the notion that Republicans will completely cave on subsidies.

It's like classic situation where if you put a one year extension for example of they say subsidies on the House floor to it would pass.

It would involve the House actually coming to work, but it would pass.

You know, with all the Democrats and maybe fifteen or so Republicans who have expressed interest, including Monica Della Cruz in Texas.

You know, people who are sort.

Of I don't know if i'd call it a front liner, but someone who's going to have a competitive race, whose district you know, has a ton of ACA and role is.

But it would pass against the you know, objection of the vast majority of Republicans.

And so if you're the Speaker, Mike Johnson, you don't want to create that situation, and so I think for Democrats there's probably an internal debate about is having a vote on this issue enough in the Senate at least, or what exactly do we negotiate here, But it's it's one of those situations where there's not a ton of incentive for House Republicans for leadership to bring it up against the wishes of most of their members, even if you know, some people acknowledge that it could be a political problem.

Well yeah, and possibly the one thing this must be part of the democratic calculus.

Possibly the one thing that could get Republicans to be okay with having a vote on this in the House floor would be Donald Trump asking for it, right, And of course, you know, he did say to CBS News this week right that he there were things he wanted to fix about Obamacare, right, although lacking specifics or how that would actually work.

So I don't know, you know, it seems like a bit of a pipe dream, but maybe there's an opening democrats.

See.

I mean, the other thing is just I think there are a lot of Democrats.

We are a long way from the November twenty twenty sixth elections.

We are a shorter way away from the twenty twenty six primaries, right, and there are a lot of Democratic primary voters who want to see their members of Congress showing resistance to Trump in whatever way possible.

Absolutely, yeah, And I think that's why a lot of Republicans expected this to be over after the No King's Rally.

But not so to see what happens with Mom Donnie first.

I did.

An older journalist said to me, he thinks that it'll get resolved tonight so that they can kick Democrats and swing states can kick mom Donnie off the headlines.

Interesting as that was just that was the one person speculation.

Yeah, that sounds like magical thinking to me.

Yeah, it was a little it was a little tinfoil hat, but New York at the.

Center of the universe.

Yeah.

Well, well it is my sincere hope that this gets resolved before Tripfest, So Gabby that you can get on an airplane and fly down here and participate, as well as the many members of Congress and other people coming from out of town.

As Eleanor gave a shout out earlier, Trip Cast will also be live at the festival with former House Speaker Dade Feelin.

So I encourage folks to visit festival dot Texastribune dot org to buy their tickets.

It is less than two weeks away, almost just a little bit over a week away.

Yeah, and I will Also while you're on our website, I believe Terry and the health teams put together a guide on how to give and receive help during this snap shutdown.

So if you want information on you know, whether you need help with food assistants or would like to contribute to food assistants, check that out.

All right, And that just about does it for today.

Thank you Gabby, Thank you Terry for lending your expertise here.

Thank you to our producers Robin Chris, thanks Eleanor, and we will talk to you all next week.