Stores across the country will get a 90-day delay on the enforcement of rules requiring shops that accept federal food benefits to stock a wider selection of items, after New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani pleaded the case directly to President Donald Trump, the mayor announced Friday.
The extension came as a relief for the city’s bodega owners especially, many of whose customers use Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits to pay for food. The rules from the U.S. Department of Agriculture mandate that shops carry seven varieties each of protein, grains, dairy and produce for authorization to accept SNAP benefits, and had an initial deadline of this month.
“Bodegas are operating on razor-thin margins,” Amr Abozaid, director of small business services at the Yemeni American Merchants Association, said at a City Hall press conference alongside Mamdani on Friday. “If we lose our SNAP, or if these stores are losing their SNAP authorization for six months, that could be the end of their businesses.”
The food assistance program helps feed nearly one in five New Yorkers, including roughly a half-million children. Bodegas are a mainstay for SNAP users, but the stores have been long criticized for a dearth of healthy options.
More than 100 bodega owners reached out to Mamdani’s office requesting more time to meet the new requirements, he said, and he brought those concerns to Trump.
“We formally raised those requests to the federal government, and I personally escalated them directly to President Trump,” Mamdani said during the press conference.
The White House did not dispute Mamdani’s account of events. “President Trump is always willing to work with those interested in helping their business community,” spokesperson Allison Schuster said in an email. “This action offers retailers accepting SNAP 90 additional days to comply with staple food stocking requirements, making sure families have access to more dairy, fruits, vegetables, grains and protein.”
The idea of stores having to meet some requirements to stock certain things could, in theory, be a good thing, according to food access expert Joel Berg, CEO of the advocacy group Hunger Free America. But the new rules seemed potentially unrealistic for bodegas, he said.
“It’s a good goal, but we don’t approve of the way they’re trying to implement it,” Berg said.
The USDA did not immediately reply to a request for comment.
SNAP Enrollment Falling
The food stocking rules come as the federal government has tightened work requirements for food benefits recipients and after Congress stopped reimbursing SNAP benefits when they are stolen as a result of fraud.
SNAP enrollment has declined in the city since Congress passed the bill affecting SNAP access, to 1.61 million in August 2026 from 1.79 million July 2025. The decrease has occurred even as grocery prices continue to rise.
Lawmakers from both parties had in recent months asked the Trump administration to delay enacting the food stocking rules.
Mamdani and Trump have had a surprisingly cooperative relationship since the mayor was elected last November, meeting most recently at Gracie Mansion in September. He has gone to the president for the release of New Yorkers detained by federal immigration agents and for financial support for the city.
“The president and I have an ongoing conversation about anything that affects our city, and for all of the policy disagreements the two of us have, we do have a shared love of the city,” Mamdani said Friday. “That does not mean that every attempt is successful. But what it does mean, however, is that there is always more than there was the day before working about a working New Yorker’s life and their needs being addressed as a result of what we talk about.”
One in four children in the city do not always know where their next meal will come from, the nonprofit City Harvest said last year. In The Bronx’s 15th Congressional District, 43% of children faced food insecurity in 2024, according to the group Feeding America.
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