More than 400,000 Arizonans have lost their SNAP benefits since July as cash-strapped state agencies administered changes called for in President Donald Trump’s so-called “One Big Beautiful Bill Act.” This is by far the largest decrease in the United States.
The drop represents nearly 47% of the state’s participants in the program, better known as food stamps, which includes about 180,000 children, according to the Arizona Department of Economic Security, which administers the program.
On Wednesday, the nonpartisan Center on Budget and Policy Priorities released data through February showing Arizona’s cuts far outpace other states. After Arizona, Florida had the largest loss of enrollees, with less than 16% of beneficiaries losing benefits since July, according to the center’s analysis.
Arizona officials attribute the sharp drop in cases to the rapid implementation of policy changes forced by the bill, including new work requirements.
But interviews suggest that Arizona’s compliance efforts and cuts to agencies administering the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, making it more difficult to apply and causing eligible people to be denied, are contributing to the decline. The state’s decline was larger than previously predicted.
“Arizona is just a wake-up call,” said Joseph Palomino, executive director of the Arizona Economic Development Center, a nonpartisan advocacy group. “This would probably happen in every state.”
The bill, which would have left most of the program’s costs on the states, expanded work requirements for some recipients and eliminated work exemptions for others, such as those who are homeless or older and out of foster care.
Additionally, the bill would require states to lower their payment error rates, which measure the accuracy of eligibility and payment decisions, or face multimillion-dollar fines. Some changes won’t fully take effect until the fall, but experts say Arizona’s experience suggests people are already going hungry as a result of the law changes.
Charisma Garcia, a 25-year-old mother of two, has been trying for months to get an interview to complete her SNAP application. After weeks of calling authorities only to receive recorded messages, she recently woke up before sunrise to wait in line at the Arizona Department of Economic Security office in south Phoenix.
The guard said the agency was not conducting in-person interviews, so he headed to the food bank instead. She needed to feed her children, ages 3 and 6.
“I have to do something to get food,” she said.
DES spokesperson Brett Bezio said the agency is focused on reducing the state’s error rate to ensure “this program remains a stable resource for vulnerable Arizonans.” Arizona’s 8.8% tax rate is below the national average, but new federal regulations call for it to drop to 6%. If officials don’t reduce the tax rate, Arizona could be fined $195.4 million over two years, more than twice what it pays to operate the program. The ministry said it expects participation to stabilize in the coming months.
The choices Arizona is making are “a reality that every state faces,” said Katie Berg, senior policy analyst at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. He said Congress created “terrible incentives” by requiring states to reduce error rates and pay more for the program.
According to estimates from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which administers SNAP, the number of SNAP enrollees nationwide plummeted by 8% from December 2024 to December 2025. President Trump is touting it as a success.
“We took 3.3 million Americans off food stamps,” he said, referring to the numbers since he took office. “That’s a record.”
Arizona has seen the largest decline in SNAP participation of any state since Congress passed the mega-law
The state has seen a monthly decline since the bill was passed on July 4th.
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Note: U.S. territories are not shown. North Dakota program data for October 2025 was excluded from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities analysis and is not shown. Source: CBPP analysis of USDA and state SNAP program data. Chris Alcantara/ProPublica
Asked about the sharp decline in SNAP participants, Liliana Soto, press secretary for Gov. Katie Hobbs, blamed the Trump administration’s policies for “increasing red tape and red tape in states across the country, forcing DES to take difficult but necessary steps to reduce payment error rates in states.” Soto said in a statement that the Hobbs administration is taking these steps to “avoid staggering hundreds of millions of dollars in fines that would further jeopardize food assistance to vulnerable Arizonans.”
But other factors are exacerbating Arizona’s situation. In 2021, the state Legislature and then-Gov. Doug Ducey passed a flat 2.5% income tax that primarily benefits the wealthy, forcing more than $1 billion in spending cuts and swaps to balance the state’s budget. (Ducey defended the flat tax as necessary to ensure the state remains competitive and “a nation that attracts jobs and creates opportunity.”)
DES also laid off about 500 employees last summer in response to the elimination of federal aid and in anticipation of additional federal cuts. Officials said about 160 credentialing professionals lost their jobs, a 40% decrease since July 2024.
In December, Democrat Hobbs allocated $7.5 million to DES, most of which was used to hire more than 100 workers and increase overtime to process SNAP cases. A spokeswoman said “1980s-era technology” used to administer benefits was also slowing claims.
Hobbs requested an additional $48.4 million in the 2027 budget proposal to help the department administer SNAP. The most recent federal data from 2023 shows the state is spending $70 million to administer the $2 billion program.
Meanwhile, some people seeking SNAP assistance told ProPublica that their applications remain pending, sometimes for months.
Garcia, a mother of two, said she will continue to strive to reap the benefits. She is looking for work as a cook after being laid off from her job at a car wash in January. Her family lives with her grandparents, and the six of them share groceries.
Her 3-year-old son sometimes rubs his belly when he’s hungry for his favorite fruit, like strawberries. Sometimes the boxes we receive from food banks don’t have fruit in them.
“I’m in a pinch,” she said. “I’m having a hard time.
