Recipients of the Supplemental Security Income, or SSI, benefit are perhaps the most vulnerable of all the beneficiaries in the Social Security program. This is because in order to qualify for SSI benefits, the individual must either have little or no income, little or no resources, a disability, blindness, or are age 65 or older. In certain cases, some individuals may even be eligible to receive both the regular Social Security benefit, as well as the SSI benefit.
Unfortunately for this cohort of vulnerable Americans, things may become a bit more precarious for them if the Trump Administration’s recently proposed rule change comes to pass. Here is everything you need to know.
How do SSI benefits work?
The Supplemental Security Income, or SSI, is paid out to those with little to no other income or resources. In order to qualify for SSI benefits, your resources cannot exceed $2,000 for individuals and $3,000 for couples. Additionally, “if you’re age 64 or younger, you must have a disability that: affects your ability to work for a year or more, or will result in death, or severely limits daily activity (for children with disabilities). If you have a disability, you’ll also need to prove you’ve earned less than $1,550 from work per month in the month you’re applying. Citizens ages 65 or older don’t need to have a disability to get SSI,” as per the Social Security Administration (SSA).
The maximum SSI benefit for 2025 is $967, however this is subject to a reduction depending on the recipient’s income from both work and non-work sources, as well as their living situation. According to the SSA, “if you live in someone else’s home and don’t pay your fair share of food and shelter costs, your SSI payment may be lowered by up to $342.33,” which is about a third of the total benefit.
However, if the recipient is living in a household where any of the members qualify for public assistance, such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), then the reduction to the SSI benefit will no longer apply. This is because of the assumption that a SNAP qualifying household would not have the financial means to adequately support an SSI beneficiary. This rule had been in place since the Biden Administration, however, the Trump Administration has now proposed that this rule be rescinded.
What happens if the SNAP rule is rescinded?
If the Trump Administration’s proposed rule change comes to pass, SNAP qualifying households will no longer be considered as “public assistance households”. This means that if an SSI beneficiary resides in a SNAP qualfiying household, their SSI benefit will be subject to a reduction.
“The proposed rule would return us to the longstanding criteria and policies that were in place for decades before 2024. We do not expect this return to the status quo to create unnecessary red tape or cause an increase in workload for SSA staff. As is standard with rulemaking processes, the proposed rule will be made publicly available, and the public will be given a chance to comment before the rule is finalized,” a spokesperson for the SSA explained in a statement.
If this rule change does come into effect, the fallout for vulnerable SSI recipients will potentially be major. According to the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP), “nearly 400,000 SSI beneficiaries living with family or friends experiencing their own financial struggles likely would have their benefits cut—typically by hundreds of dollars per month—or lose eligibility altogether.”
The SSA who is tasked with paying the SSI benefits monthly is already said to be struggling with reduced staffing, and according to the CBPP, this rule change would create a lot of additional red tape for the agency.
“While more details will become available when the details of the proposed rule are made public, removing SNAP as a qualifying form of public assistance would likely result in benefit cuts for over 275,000 people and loss of eligibility for over 100,000 more, based on a 2024 SSA analysis,” the CBPP outlined in a report from August 2025.