Since the budget reconciliation bill passed in July 2025, an estimated 5.5 million people nationwide—including at least 1.5 million children—have already lost their SNAP benefits, leaving many families heading into the holidays with less help buying food.

Across rural America, hospitals are shutting down the units where babies are born. Across Africa, the clinics that American aid kept running are losing midwives, blood banks, and basic supplies. The common thread is federal funding that has disappeared in the past year.

A year after the U.S. government shut down USAID, the head of the Catholic Church's global relief network says ministries are doing "less with less"—and the world's poorest are paying the price.