I Did Not Realize That Some States Allowed EBT Cards to Be Used to ‘Have It Your Way’

This is new to me in the current battle to tighten the ballooning Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and the EBT cards used to access the money that comes with that social welfare benefit.

For all the reporting I’ve done here over the past year and a half, I had never heard that the Department of Agriculture (USDA), which administers all of these assistance programs, has a subcategory of program for eligible SNAP beneficiaries that, if the state has bought into it, would allow them to purchase meals in restaurants. Not just buy the groceries and food products we associate with SNAP.

But so they do.

SNAP Restaurant Meals Program

The Restaurant Meals Program (RMP) is a state option to allow certain SNAP clients, who might not be able to prepare meals for themselves or who do not have permanent housing for storing and preparing food, to be able to buy prepared meals at restaurants with their SNAP benefits.

Which Clients can use their SNAP Benefits at Restaurants?

To be eligible for the RMP, SNAP clients must be certified for SNAP in a state that has an RMP and all members of the household must be either:

• Elderly (60 years of age or older);
• disabled (receives disability or blindness payments or receives disability retirement benefits from a governmental agency because of a disability considered permanent);
• homeless; or
• a spouse of a SNAP client who is eligible for the RMP.

Which Restaurants can Participate in the RMP?

To participate in the RMP, the restaurant must:

• Be in a state that has an RMP.
• Get approval from the state and provide a signed agreement to FNA.
• Be authorized by FNA to accept SNAP benefits.

Each state can set their own requirements for choosing how many and which restaurants they want to allow to participate in their state’s RMP. For more information, please contact the RMP contact for your participating state listed below.

Well, knock me over with a feather, and it didn’t have to be a really big feather when I learned this morning that this restaurant program has cost federal taxpayers almost half a billion dollars in just two years’ time.

Fast-food chains across America have raked in at least $524 million in taxpayer funds through the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) in the past three years, according to estimates from a group of lawmakers.

While government-subsidized SNAP benefits are intended for at-home food and beverage consumption by low-income Americans, states like New York and California have expanded their Restaurant Meals Program (RMP) to allow beneficiaries to indulge at places like Subway, McDonald’s, Burger King, Wendy’s, KFC, and Dairy Queen.

“SNAP is intended to feed hungry families with nutritious food, but loopholes have funneled half-a-billion dollars to burgers and fries,” said US Sen. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa), who is leading a group of eight lawmakers urging Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins to revisit the program.

You will NEVER guess which of only eight states to participate (making that massive figure even more barf-inducing) has led the charge in blowing through the most cash at the drive-through!

Then again, of course you will – naturally, it was California. They do all the grifting heavy lifting better there. Greasy Gavin’s Greedy Grifters beat the next best contestant – Arizona, who looks like positive slackers by comparison – for dollars flushed by a factor of ten.

…Approximately $524 million in SNAP benefits was spent at restaurants in nine states participating in the program between June 2023 and May 2025, according to data previously reported by the Post.

California accounted for the vast majority of the spending, at approximately $475 million. Arizona followed at $41.4 million, while New York accounted for $3.6 million.

The other participating states were Michigan, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Illinois, Virginia, and Maryland.

Thank you, Texas Congressman Brandon Gill, for once again shining a light on what has to be a popular but OMG expensive black hole.

And now we’re back to being painted as heartless Republican thugs again, because he’s introduced something called the Ending Restaurant Purchases with SNAP Act. 

First, they moved to require the purchase of real food with these billions of taxpayer dollars, and now they’re attempting to tear McDonald’s bags with newly reintroduced apple pies from clenched fists. 

I mean, what’s left to strip from ‘the most vulnerable‘ people that they can buy with other people’s money?

Some of the most vulnerable low income Americans may no longer be able to use their SNAP benefits to buy fast food restaurant meals, under a new law proposed by a Texas Republican.

Representative Brandon Gill introduced the Ending Restaurant Purchases with SNAP Act on Thursday, legislation that would eliminate the SNAP Restaurant Meals Program (RMP), preventing claimants from using their vouchers to get prepared food from any participating restaurants, including McDonald’s and Burger King.

As our map shows, the bill would impact nine states that have RMP in place, including California and New York.

…SNAP benefits are paid to low- and no-income households across the United States, with benefits loaded onto cards that can be spent at participating grocery stores and some restaurants. Around 37 million people are enrolled in the program.

The proposal comes as the Trump administration attempts to steer SNAP toward healthier purchases, approving a slate of state waivers that restrict benefits from being used to purchase products including soda and candy under the banner of its Make America Healthy Again, or MAHA, agenda.

Gil’s a heartless you-know-what, you know, Newsweek insinuates.

For my part, I’m still stuck on ‘McDonald’s and Burger King.’

So is Gill.

For all the angst, one has to wonder how there have not been mass-casualty events across the non-participating majority of states if their SNAP beneficiaries had no access to the drive-through at McDonald’s. Meals-on-Wheels and those sorts of programs seem to already be operating efficiently in communities in the forty-one states that didn’t need to send their ‘vulnerable’ to McDonald’s and Burger King for ‘prepared foods’ to survive. And they aren’t part of the proposed ban in Gil’s bill,

These time-proven meal delivery programs will still receive the supplemental funding they’ve always gotten for the good work they do.

Freshman Rep. Brandon Gill, R-Texas, introduced legislation Thursday that would prohibit restaurants from accepting Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits, arguing food stamps should be reserved for groceries rather than prepared meals.

The Texas Republican’s Ending Restaurant Purchases with SNAP Act would eliminate the program’s Restaurant Meals Program, which allows certain SNAP recipients to use their benefits to buy hot, prepared food from participating restaurants, reports the New York Post on Thursday.

“SNAP is supposed to help struggling Americans put nutritious food on the table, not stick taxpayers with the bill for fast food,” Gill said in a statement.

“More than half a billion dollars in SNAP benefits have gone to restaurants through this loophole in just two years while the Trump administration is working to get junk food out of the program,” he added.

…Gill’s legislation would end restaurant participation but preserve the ability of public and nonprofit organizations to provide meals to SNAP beneficiaries. That would include programs providing home-delivered meals to elderly and disabled recipients.

Change happens pretty quickly around here anymore.

Today, I introduced legislation to end the fast-food loophole and refocus SNAP on nutritious groceries for struggling Americans.

Here in Michigan pic.twitter.com/62exDNHqkw

— Beri (@sniffydogs) September 4, 2026

It’s a sign of better times.

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