WASHINGTON – Two federal judges on Friday ordered the Trump administration to continue paying for food assistance that was set to end amid the government shutdown, but it was unclear when families in Washington state and Idaho would receive the benefits.

About 42 million low-income Americans rely on the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program, or SNAP, formerly known as food stamps, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which runs the program. Nearly 930,000 Washingtonians and almost 125,000 Idahoans receive the monthly benefits, the agencies that administer them in each state say.

The regular federal funding that states use to administer the benefits – roughly $8 billion a month, or an average of $187 per recipient – ran out on Friday as the government shutdown reached

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