More than 600,000 Californians could lose CalFresh food benefits when expanded work requirements take effect in June, a shift that will reach people up to age 64 and tighten the rules for one of the state’s largest safety-net programs.
In Los Angeles County alone, about 260,000 people are at risk under the new requirements, and Hilda Solis warned that the change will hit people who are already struggling. “These expanded work requirements are going to create more barriers for people who are already struggling to meet ends,” Solis said.
The new limits come from the One Big Beautiful Bill, signed into law by President Donald Trump last summer. CalFresh, California’s version of SNAP, serves about 5.4 million people, and the expanded work rules are only one of three major changes planned for this year. The other two will narrow eligibility for some people without U.S. citizenship and alter the program’s funding so more costs are pushed to state and local governments.
Under the June rules, some adults will have to work, volunteer or take part in school or job training for 20 hours a week. Those who do not meet the requirement will be limited to three months of CalFresh benefits every three years. The rules now extend to people up to age 64; before, they applied only to people up to age 54.
The change is likely to hit several groups that often face unstable work or housing, including people experiencing homelessness, veterans and former foster youth, unless they qualify for another exemption. People who cannot meet the hours because of a physical or mental illness are exempt, as are people caring for children under 14 years old. Even so, Solis said the policy is aimed at shutting people out rather than helping them move into steadier work. “It’s not about creating opportunity, it’s about making it harder for people to keep the benefits that they already qualify for,” she said.
The impact is also being felt before the June deadline. About 108,000 people in Los Angeles County have already lost their CalFresh benefits since the bill was passed last July, and the roughly 260,000 Angelenos now considered at risk may not lose aid immediately. They will be judged under the new rules when they apply or recertify, meaning the full effect will roll out over time rather than all at once.
That is what makes this month matter: the state is entering the first phase of a broader federal overhaul that could leave people to fall out of the program without ever having a chance to adapt. In April, eligibility rules already changed for certain Californians without U.S. citizenship, disqualifying some groups including refugees and victims of trafficking, and an estimated 72,000 people were expected to lose benefits because of the narrower eligibility. Then in October, the funding model is expected to change again, with California facing roughly $480 million in new annual costs and counties facing $190 million more.
The added pressure lands on a program designed to help low-income households buy food, and the sequence of changes leaves counties to manage the fallout step by step. The work rules start in June. The citizenship-related cuts followed in April. The financing shift comes in October. Together, they make CalFresh less generous, less stable and more expensive for the state and counties to sustain.
For the people already caught in the transition, the question is not whether the rules are coming. It is whether they will still be able to keep food aid long enough to make the paperwork, the hours and the deadlines line up.
