The number of Florida residents who receive federal food assistance dropped by 23% during the past year, state data published this month show.
Flagler County has 22 percent fewer beneficiaries than it did a year ago. According to the Department of Children and Families, Flagler County had 13,396 food stamps clients in July 2025. The case load dropped to 10,388 in June. That is the lowest number of local residents on food assistance since September 2009, when the caseload was 10,085, and the county’s population was 35 percent smaller.
In Florida, there were 2,285,099 residents enrolled in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) in June, down from the 2,970,283 in June 2025, data maintained by the Department of Children and Families show. (See the full data here.)
That’s about a 23% reduction. SNAP enrollment dropped steadily in each of the past 12 months, as it has in Flagler County (where enrollment dropped in 11 of the last 12 months).
Likewise Flagler County households receiving food assistance declined from 6,980 a year ago to 5,514 in June, a 21 percent decline. There were 52,582 households in Flagler County in the last three-year estimate of the Census Bureau.
In cash issuance for food stamps, the county went from $2.3 million last July to $1.7 million in June, representing a significant cumulative loss of money circulating in the local economy through grocery stores. (Medicaid, the insurance program for the poor, also shed some 500 clients in Flagler County, from 19,292 a year ago.)
“I am concerned that this is a sign of our already thin safety net being stretched even thinner,” Carrie Baird, chief executive officer of Flagler Cares in Palm Coast, said. “For many households, SNAP is the last remaining source of basic support that helps stabilize their family during difficult times. As the administrative requirements for SNAP increase, households without reliable internet access, a computer, or the skills needed to navigate a completely online application process simply cannot complete the application—even if they would otherwise be eligible for assistance.”
Across the state, the decrease in SNAP clients was outpaced by the 26.1% reduction in financial assistance awarded, from nearly $541 million in June 2025 to about $399 million last month. Annualized, that means Florida’s economy will lose $1.7 billion if the cash amount dispensed were to remain at June’s level, compared to a year ago. (Florida’s economy generates about $1.8 trillion in economic activity.)
Enrollment in social services programs such as SNAP is countercyclical, meaning it increases as the economy worsens. But the drop-off in SNAP enrollment occurred even as the state’s unemployment rate increased during the year, U.S. Bureau and Labor Statistics data show–especially in Flagler County: Flagler County’s unemployment rate was at 5.5 percent in June, up from 4.7 percent a year ago.
The number of enrollees in SNAP was dipping before the July 2025 enactment of the Trump administration’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act but increased as the law took effect. The law slashes spending on the food security program by $187 billion over a decade.
To accomplish those costs savings, Congress required states with SNAP payment error rates of more than 6% to contribute toward the costs of the food beginning next year.
Under the law, states with error rates of 10% or more would have to contribute 15% toward food costs, which puts Florida on track to have to pay upward of $1 billion to maintain food benefits at existing levels.
Payment error rates measure the accuracy of each state’s eligibility and benefit determinations and include overpayments and underpayments.
The federal law also:
- Limited the categories of lawfully present immigrants who could qualify for benefits.
- Extend work requirements to older adults aged 55 through 64 and parents with children aged 14 and older.
- Eliminated work requirement exemptions for veterans, people experiencing homelessness, and young people who recently aged out of foster care.
SNAP provides nutritional support for low-income seniors, people with disabilities living on fixed incomes, and other individuals and families with low incomes. Although funded by the federal government, SNAP in Florida is administered by DCF’s Office of Economic Self-Sufficiency, which is responsible for determining eligibility.
“When federal and state resources become inaccessible, families turn to their local community—to food banks, churches, nonprofits, and local government,” Baird said. “I believe we will find that, in Flagler County, there simply isn’t enough assistance available to meet this growing need. More households will fall through the gaps, not because they don’t qualify for help, but because they cannot access it.”
National trend
Florida is not the only state to see a reduction in SNAP enrollees, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, but it experienced one of the more noticeable dips.
Nationwide, SNAP participation fell by more than 4.5 million people, or about 11%, since the federal budget bill took effect, the nonpartisan research and policy institute reports. Arizona saw a 44% reduction in its SNAP participation from July 2025 to June 2026 and Louisiana had a 21% reduction.
The center put Florida’s reduction rate at 21% and Oklahoma’s at 18%.
The center relied on data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Federal data differ from state data due to differences in state and federal reporting protocols.
The atrophy in enrollment occurred despite a double-digit increase in the number of requests for assistance, which from June 2025 to June 2026 jumped by 15.2%.
–Christine Sexton, Florida Phoenix, and FlaglerLive
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