When SNAP Payments Stalled, a Surprise $50 Gift Came

As 2025 started to wane, finances already looked tight for Jade Grant and her three children, among the nearly 42 million lower-income Americans who get help with groceries from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP. Circumstances got even dicier after the federal shutdown started in October and President Trump took the unprecedented step of freezing November SNAP payments. Then Grant logged into Propel, an app used by 5 million people to manage their electronic benefits transfers, where she saw a pop-up banner inviting her to apply for a relief program, per the AP. Within a minute she'd completed a survey, and about two days later she got a virtual $50 gift card.

Nearly a quarter of a million families received that same cash injection from the nonprofit GiveDirectly as they missed SNAP deposits many need to feed their households. The collaboration with Propel proved to be the largest disaster response in the international cash assistance group's history outside of COVID-19—nonpandemic records were set, with $12 million raised, more than 246,000 beneficiaries enrolled, and 5,000 individual donors reached.

It's not the first partnership for the antipoverty nonprofit and for-profit software company. They've previously combined GiveDirectly's fast-cash model with Propel's verified user base to get money out to natural disaster survivors, including $1,000 last year to some households impacted by hurricanes Milton and Helene. "This particular incident with the shutdown we saw as akin to a natural disaster, in the sense that it created a really sudden and really acute form of hardship for many Americans across the country," says Propel CEO Jimmy Chen. The benefits freeze impacted more people than they usually serve, however. SNAP costs almost $10 billion a month, per GiveDirectly exec Dustin Palmer, so they never expected to raise enough money to replace the delayed benefits altogether.

But 5,000 individual donors—plus $1 million gifts from Propel and New York nonprofit Robin Hood, as well as other major foundations' support—provided a sizable pot. GiveDirectly reports that the median donation was $100. At a time when users felt the existing safety net had fallen through, they credit the rapid payments for buoying them, both financially and emotionally. "It's not a lot. But at the same time, it is a lot," Grant says. "Because $50 can do a lot when you don't have anything." More here.