Judge Orders White House to Pay for SNAP Food Benefits

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Caitlin McCabe (0:33)

Tesla CEO Elon Musk secures a controversial pay package, paving his way to become the world's first trillionaire. Plus, a federal judge orders the Trump administration to fully fund food stamp benefits by today. And we unpack what's behind the recent nuclear testing threats from Moscow and Washington.

Thomas Grove (0:55)

It's very much about political signaling and trying to make sure that the other side understands where the red lines are.

Caitlin McCabe (1:01)

It's Friday, November 7th. I'm Caitlin McCabe for The Wall Street Journal, and here is the AM Edition of What's News. The top headlines and business stories moving your world today. Tesla shareholders have approved CEO Elon Musk's $1 trillion dollar pay package, with the announcement coming at the EV maker's annual meeting held in Austin, Texas.

Tesla reporter Becky Peterson says Musk took to the stage, flanked by dancing humanoid robots, to thank shareholders who supported the package, despite the measure being hotly debated, with some large shareholders taking opposing sides.

Becky Peterson (1:41)

The general council said that 75% of the votes cast were in favor of the package, which could be worth as much as $1 trillion or 12% of the company for Musk if he hits all of the goals in the package. Now that also includes votes from Musk himself. He owns about 15% of the company right now. So outside of Musk, we see around 60% of the votes cast were in favor of the package.

Caitlin McCabe (2:07)

Also on the docket at yesterday's meeting was a proposal asking Tesla's board to make an investment in Musk's AI startup XAI. Becky explains that shareholders gave mixed support to the idea, with confusion remaining over whether or not the board had passed the proposal.

Becky Peterson (2:24)

The GC said basically that while most shares were cast in favor, there were a lot of voters who abstained from voting. And he emphasized that this was a non-binding proposal and that the board would take this feedback from shareholders into consideration. So he's sort of saying, like, don't expect investment based off of this news. We still don't know exactly what percentage of shareholders voted for what. And we also don't know yet how most of the large institutional shareholders voted.

Caitlin McCabe (2:59)

Musk had publicly endorsed the idea as he seeks to catch up in the AI race, adding that he plans to transform Tesla from an EV maker into a robotics and AI juggernaut.

The extended fight over food assistance benefits has a new wrinkle, with a federal judge ordering the Trump administration to fully fund SNAP benefits for November by today. Earlier this week, the White House said it would use roughly $4.6 billion from a contingency fund to pay partial food stamp benefits, which is a little more than half of the program's $8 billion monthly cost. But the government said it could take weeks or months for states to calculate and distribute the reduced payments to the 42 million Americans who use them. The administration declined to use other funds to make up the shortfall. Judge John McConnell chided the government yesterday, saying the White House violated last week's order requiring the government to tap emergency funds and quote, expeditiously pay benefits. He ordered the administration to find another funding source to make up the gap. The administration's lawyers said they would appeal. Separately, Vice President JD Vance criticized the order.

JD Vance (4:13)

It's an absurd ruling because you have a federal judge effectively telling us what we have to do in the midst of a Democrat government shutdown, which what we'd like to do is for the Democrats to open up the government. Of course, then we can fund SNAP and we can also do a lot of other good things for the American people. But in the midst of a shutdown, we can't have a federal court telling the president how he has to triage the situation.

Caitlin McCabe (4:35)

Across the country, people like Nazir Kohli in New Jersey have lined up at food banks and pantries for assistance and have pleaded for the government to find a resolution.

Nazir Kohli (4:46)

My message to the people in Washington would be just to get it together. We need to all work together. Regardless of whose side we're on, we all need to work together as people, human beings.