Everybody, hello. Welcome back to The Bullwork. It's me, Sam Stein managing editor at this site.

And I'm joined by Arthur Delaney, a friend of the Bullwork, a repeat guest.

We debated having him back on because he was so atrociously terribly wrong with this prediction about how long the government shutdown would last.

It's true.

What'd you say?

Three weeks?

I said it would be three weeks, but there was a caveat, Sam, which was that I don't know.

It's a reckless prediction because you asked me to make a reckless prediction.

Well, either way, you were wrong.

Yes, I was wrong.

And I questioned whether to have you back.

But we're going to give you another chance.

We're going to talk about actually serious topic, which is SNAP, the food assistance

program that is expiring tomorrow.

The Congress and the administration are not, the Congress not passing a bill to release the emergency funds.

The administration is saying it can't release the emergency funds.

There is a court decision that could potentially impact this.

But let's start even further back because Arthur, people should know this about Arthur.

Arthur's been reporting on this stuff for as long as I can remember.

He's one of the few reporters in Washington, D.C., who obsesses about this issue.

And so for the people who are not necessarily well-versed on this program, Arthur, tell us a little

bit about SNAP, and then we can get into the contours of the current issue at hand.

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