Real journalists wrote and edited this (not AI)—independent, community-driven journalism survives because you back it. Donate to sustain Prism’s mission and the humans behind it.

When the federal government shut down this fall and SNAP benefits were abruptly disrupted, Indigenous communities across the country recognized the pattern immediately.

“That creates panic and fear and a weaponization of food,” said Mary Green-Trottier, the director of the Spirit Lake Tribe’s Food Distribution Program on Indian Reservations (FDPIR) in North Dakota and president of the National Association of Food Distribution Programs on Indian Reservations. “It’s especially historical trauma to tribes.”

The shutdown’s timing, on the heels of already reduced SNAP funding and new eligibility requirements, exposed once again how fragile and punitive federal food systems are for Indigenous people. From salmon fishers along the Columbia River to bison-herding nations across the Great Plains, tribal leaders and organizers stepped in to meet needs that federal programs could not. These groups provided meat, fish, and traditional knowledge with the goal of ensuring their communities become more self-sufficient and less reliant on a federal government that frequently betrays them. Their message is clear: Indigenous food systems are the path forward.

“Our tribes have gone through pandemics, we’ve gone through assimilation, we’ve gone through a lot of different atrocities throughout history, and we’re still here as people,” said Buck Jones, a Cayuse tribal member and salmon marketing specialist at the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission (CRITFC). “Hopefully, we’ll sustain going through these too.”

The strain of SNAP restrictions

In South Dakota, Valeriah Big Eagle, the director of He Sapa Initiatives, part of Indigenous advocacy organization NDN Collective, watched the shutdown immediately strain Indigenous households on reservations and in the community where she lives in Rapid City, South Dakota.

“We’ve seen a lot of families struggling to make ends meet with food, because already we have a disproportionate amount of our communities that are reliant upon SNAP benefits,” Big Eagle said.

Foster Cenoyer Hogan, NDN Collective’s Buffalo Nations coordinator, rejected the idea that these shortages are natural.

“Some people say food deserts,” said Hogan, who is Sicangu Lakota and a tribal citizen of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe. “I say food apartheid, because it’s an imposed system. On my reservation, there are two grocery stores, and the land mass is larger than Delaware.”

According to Hogan, over half of the people living on the reservation utilize SNAP benefits. Even after the shutdown ended, SNAP returned only partially funded. 

The ripple effect is immediate and severe. Across the country, tribal members along the Columbia River were having similar conversations.

“What I’ve heard from our tribal members is that it’s frustrating, but not surprising,” said Jones.

While CRITFC does not administer SNAP or FDPIR, it provides technical support to its four member tribes. As someone who works directly with fishers, Jones said he sees how federal instability compounds hardship. For tribal members who work for federal agencies, the impact of the government shutdown was compounded because they weren’t getting paychecks or SNAP benefits.

“Multigenerational households are impacted because children are living with their grandparents and parents,” Jones said. “So it impacts all the above.”

Indigenous food sovereignty

In North Dakota, Spirit Lake’s FDPIR caseload has grown by roughly 60% since April, according to Green-Trottier, as people transitioned over to the program while SNAP benefits were absent. FDPIR is a federal program that distributes food to low-income households on Indigenous reservations. It is administered via Indian Tribal Organizations or state agencies that receive food shipments from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

During the government shutdown, Spirit Lake tribal leadership slaughtered bison from their herd to help meet food needs. FDPIR also distributed emergency cash vouchers, redeemable only at local vendors, to keep the money within the community, as well as a semi-load of shelf-stable foods from the Great Plains Food Bank. In just a couple of weeks, Green-Trottier said, they likely served about 800 households.

Coordination became harder as some federal regional offices were unreachable during the shutdown. Meanwhile, Green-Trottier worried that a warehouse shortage, caused by under-ordering and a single-warehouse contract in 2024, could repeat itself soon.

“We held consultations, and we discussed that whenever there’s an influx in one program, it’s going to decrease the other,” Green-Trottier said. 

Jones said the shutdown echoed lessons learned during the COVID-19 pandemic when tribes had to take care of themselves and their own members, asking harvesters or producers if they had supplemental product to give to food distribution programs. Some tribes found emergency funding to replace lost SNAP benefits during the pandemic. Others coordinated donations from local producers.

According to Jones, the timing of the recent shutdown limited salmon distribution on the Columbia River because it came at the very end of the fall fishing season. Even so, tribes have been expanding food sovereignty work: local food purchase agreements, gardening programs, canning and preservation classes, and efforts to restore traditional harvesting practices.

“Providing those kind of classes, so you do have food put away, is important,” Jones said. 

Bringing back bison

In the Great Plains, that reawakening of traditional knowledge centers on bison.

Hogan noted that the U.S. historically used food as a weapon, slaughtering millions of bison during the wars with Native tribes to starve Indigenous nations. “This is nothing new to us,” he said.

This fall, NDN Collective launched its “Feed the People” campaign, distributing boxes of bison meat as emergency relief and cultural reclamation.

“Bison is a staple protein source, a traditional staple ingredient in our Lakota and Plains diet,” Hogan explained. “Culturally and spiritually, it aligns with who we are as a people.”

The boxes included recipes, recognizing that some families are reconnecting with traditional foods after generations of forced reliance on federal commodities.

We’re relearning and reconnecting with our bison relatives and our traditional diets.

Valeriah Big Eagle, director of He Sapa Initiatives

“We’re relearning and reconnecting with our bison relatives and our traditional diets,” Big Eagle said.

At the same time, NDN Collective launched the Bison Homelands Initiative, known in Lakota as “Tatanka ki Inyáŋg Kupí kte,” or “the buffalo will return home running,” according to Hogan. The project’s first major goal is a buffalo corridor stretching from the Black Hills in the Great Plains to the Missouri River across Pine Ridge, Wind Cave, the Badlands, and neighboring lands.

“It takes coordination and generational planning, working with tribes, nonprofits, individuals, and the federal government,” Big Eagle said. “If we take care of the buffalo, treat them as relatives. They’ll be able to take care of us, because they’ll also restore the traditional grasslands of our homelands.”

Hogan added that bison are climate stewards.

“Once we get land back, the bison will have the opportunity to roam as they should: to steward the land, aerate the soil, store carbon, and restore biodiversity of grasslands, which are then also our plants and medicines that we use culturally, our foods, etc., that restores natural wildlife as it should be.”

At Spirit Lake, Green-Trottier has incorporated locally sourced bison into FDPIR through self-determination grants, including meat from the tribe’s own herd. “It’s a healthier product, and it’s ours,” she said.

Systemic problems

The shutdown highlighted a longstanding structural issue: Families cannot receive SNAP and FDPIR at the same time. Both Jones and Green-Trottier said this rule forces impossible choices.

“You can’t get both simultaneously, or you’ll be penalized,” Green-Trottier said. 

Penalties can include up to a year of suspension and repayment of food. Jones noted that the Native Farm Bill Coalition has been trying for years to end the “either/or” requirement. 

Communication breakdowns also created confusion and fear. Green-Trottier said many families worried they would be penalized for seeking help from FDPIR while SNAP was suspended, particularly because state SNAP call centers were disconnected from local context.

“There hasn’t been enough communication,” she said. “We’re trying to work with the state agency to create guidance. Co-location of the SNAP office in our building helped, but not everyone has that.”

Jones sees a broader failure of federal responsibility.

“Trust, responsibility that the government holds is not being [honored] with this administration,” Jones said. “Tribal consultation is not happening as with the previous administrations.”

Federal attacks on diversity, equity, and inclusion funding and culturally relevant grant programs only add to the instability, he added. Despite these challenges, Indigenous leaders who spoke to Prism emphasized that their communities are revitalizing their own food systems.

At Spirit Lake, Green-Trottier has been working with tribal leadership to reclaim land for gardening and expand the senior farmers market program. Her staff runs children’s gardening camps to help young people learn where food comes from.

“My goal is to develop that instinct and become more self-sufficient,” Green-Trottier said.

Jones sees a similar movement along the Columbia River, where harvesting, fishing, and preservation traditions are resurging. 

For Big Eagle and Hogan, this is “seventh-generation planning”—visioning across decades, not election cycles.

“Success looks like healthy food systems, our nations being healthy again, not being dependent on the federal government,” Big Eagle said “If we remember who we are, even in our traditional food diets, we will take care of our physical health.”

Correction, Feb. 11, 2026: This story was updated to correct the spelling of Foster Cenoyer Hogan’s name.

Editorial Team:
Sahar Fatima, Lead Editor
Carolyn Copeland, Top Editor
Rashmee Kumar, Copy Editor