Military-connected community members wait in line at Armed Services YMCA food pantry in Harker Heights, Texas, on Oct. 30, 2025. (Rose L. Thayer/Stars and Stripes)

HARKER HEIGHTS, Texas — Dolce Garcia didn’t know for certain if her husband’s paycheck from the Army would come through this week as expected.

Feeling anxious and far from her family in Las Vegas, she said she’s been worrying about their rent and buying diapers for her almost 2-year-old son, so she waited in line Thursday at Armed Services YMCA food pantry where she grabbed Pop-Tarts, mini raviolis and carrots from the shelves.

“It’s just because of the shutdown,” Garcia said of coming to the food pantry.

With Congress unable to come to an agreement by Oct. 1 to fund the federal government, resources are slowly draining from federal accounts. Federal workers are not getting paychecks, though many are still required to go to work. Medicaid has said it’s beginning to run out of funding. The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) was set to stop payments Nov. 1, but two federal judges on Friday ruled that the federal government must continue to fund SNAP, at least partially, with contingency funds. The Trump administration is expected to appeal.

Troops, too, are caught in the crosshairs. President Donald Trump ordered the Pentagon to rearrange funding to pay service members on Oct. 15. They’re getting their Nov. 1 paychecks, too, the Pentagon and Office of Management and Budget confirmed Thursday. The Trump administration pulled funds from three accounts totaling $5.3 billion. However, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said on Oct. 26 that troops will start going without pay by Nov. 15 if the shutdown continues.

“It’s concerning because there’s no security of whether you’re going to get paid or not. It’s not until the last day that we know if they will be paying us,” Garcia said. “As junior enlisted, we don’t have a lot of savings.”

This month was the first time she sought out such a resource because of the constant uncertainty of whether her husband, a private first class at Fort Hood, Texas, will get his pay. Garcia also started the paperwork for additional resources to help with rent — just in case this shutdown continues and there is a gap in pay.

She’s not alone. The Armed Services YMCA food pantry in Harker Heights, dedicated to active-duty service members, has seen its food distribution jump from 8,000 pounds to 14,000 pounds a week, said Sheri Yerrington, executive director of the ASYMCA of Killeen.

A family selects items at the Armed Services YMCA food pantry in Harker Heights, Texas, on Oct. 30, 2025. (Rose L. Thayer/Stars and Stripes)

Across all ASYMCA locations nationwide, food distribution centers have seen a 30% increase, the nonprofit said.

In the Killeen area, it supports the military community of Fort Hood with food assistance, diaper distributions, day care and a play space for kids inside the Fort Hood hospital, which allows parents to drop off children to attend medical appointments.

“Every week, we’re going out and we’re working hard to raise money so that we can buy that extra food to put on the shelf so that we don’t run out. Normally, we’re out by noon,” Yerrington said.

Because there is such a need in the community, ASYMCA only distributes food two days a week. Yerrington said she’d like to be open every day.

“There’s so much going on in their lives,” she said. “They should not have to worry about where dinner is coming from tonight or breakfast in the morning for their children.”

At the Liberty County Manna House, a faith-based food and clothing bank in Hinesville, Ga., just outside the gates of Fort Stewart, officials have seen a dramatic increase in food needs in the Army-heavy community where thousands of federal workers have been furloughed without pay for nearly a month.

“It’s been building,” said the Rev. Katrina Deason, Manna House’s executive director. “We’re seeing heavier and heavier traffic because of the government shutdown, but with the situation with SNAP — it’s unprecedented, quite frankly.”

Deason said the food pantry that has always served Fort Stewart soldiers and their families — especially junior enlisted troops who receive low pay to support dependents — but more have shown up looking for food during the shutdown as they worried about receiving a paycheck. Fewer soldiers have shown up in recent days as they were assured of being paid, she said.

A soldier selects items at the Armed Services YMCA food pantry in Harker Heights, Texas, on Oct. 30, 2025. (Rose L. Thayer/Stars and Stripes)

With SNAP benefits on the line, Deason began looking back at Manna House plans from the 2020 coronavirus pandemic, which was the last time the organization experienced a large uptick in need.

“In our planning we’ve put together contingency plans using the COVID model to help plan for the increase in requests for food,” she said. “We’re scrambling for food, and really, there’s no way for us to fill that gap completely. We’re just trying not to panic and to plan well.”

She said Manna House will need more donations than it ever needed before.

“This is going to be something that is going to be really hard on a lot of families — and on our soldiers and their families,” Deason said.

‘Already vulnerable’

The government shutdown has highlighted a known, growing concern of food insecurity among military families, said Emily Becher, senior director of research and evaluation at Blue Star Families. The nonprofit, which advocates on behalf of military families, said its research found that nearly 20% of active-duty military families said they have visited a food pantry or received food support in the past year.

Exact statistics aren’t available, but 1 to 2% of military families receive government assistance through SNAP. However, because the military housing allowance counts toward income in how the program assesses need, many families who could use the support are disqualified, Becher said.

“They were already vulnerable before this happened,” Becher said. “That, to me, is such an important part of the story.”

Outside of SNAP, formerly known as food stamps, 25% of military families are on another government food program — Women, Infants and Children (WIC) — and 10% of active-duty children rely on Medicaid to cover what Tricare does not, according to the Military Family Foundation.

Many military families also rely on just the service member’s paycheck to support the whole family because military spouse unemployment sits at around 22% — significantly higher than the 4.3% U.S. national average, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. For troops stationed overseas, that alone can be a hardship. Spouses can struggle to find work because of U.S. and NATO country prohibitions that keep military spouses from working overseas.

“We no longer live in a world that provides the basics on a single income,” the ASYMCA of Camp Pendleton (Calif.) said in a statement. Spouse unemployment is “just one of the many unique challenges that come with the frequent moves and unpredictability inherent to military life.”

While it’s the missed paychecks that make the headlines, Maria Donnelly, co-founder of the Military Family Foundation, said the shutdown is affecting the entire ecosystem of support on which military families rely.

“This is all through no fault of their own,” she said. “Most Americans live paycheck to paycheck, and the military is affected by so many additional factors — moving away from support systems, systemic challenges to accessing childcare, persistently high spouse unemployment, all of which further undercut the stability and financial security of families. This uncertainty itself creates mental stress and directly impacts the readiness of our fighting force.”

A woman selects items at the Armed Services YMCA food pantry in Harker Heights, Texas, on Oct. 30, 2025. (Rose L. Thayer/Stars and Stripes)

Kalin Middlebrooks, a volunteer at the Armed Services YMCA food pantry in Harker Heights, Texas, restocks shelves between visitors Oct. 30, 2025. (Rose L. Thayer/Stars and Stripes)

Stepping up to help

At U.S. military installations in Germany, Americans have sprung into action to help with basic needs, even as they struggle with the uncertainty of the shutdown — standing up food pantries in thrift stores and housing areas.

At Hohenfels, a tight-knit Army community in rural Bavaria, a $5,000 emergency welfare grant from the Hohenfels Community and Spouses’ Club launched a food pantry, said Allicia Edstrom-Fairbanks, the lead volunteer for the effort.

All requests for assistance have so far come from families in which both parents are furloughed or a service member with a spouse not receiving a paycheck, she said. Diapers and wipes are the most requested items and requests for nonperishable groceries and other household and self-care products are filled via a QR code application, she said.

The process “allows us to know what items they need, and also allows us to track how often they are coming to the food pantry,” said Capt. Joshua “Troy” Cook, an Army chaplain.

A new food pantry was opened in the gazebo next to the chapel on Patch Barracks in Stuttgart, Germany. It’s open 24 hours and anyone is welcome to use it. It’s one of four new food pantries in the Stuttgart military community aimed at helping families in need during the partial government shutdown. (Erin Henderson)

“If people are coming consistently, maybe there is something more we could be doing than just basic assistance,” he said. “This is something we want to continue past the shutdown, especially with the holidays coming.”

The Ramstein Enlisted Spouses’ Association at Ramstein Air Base near Kaiserslautern recently expanded its food pantry inside the base thrift store with the help of community donations, said Alicia Petersen, the thrift store manager and spouse of a U.S. soldier.

In Stuttgart, there were no food pantries just a few weeks ago. Now there are three, with a fourth set to open on Sunday, including one operating from a gazebo near the Patch Barracks chapel.

Two more pantries are up and running in the fellowship center on Kelley Barracks and in the Red Cross building on Panzer Kaserne. Another one will open Sunday at Robinson Barracks.

“The military is known to be resilient,” said Shay Miller, the spouse of a U.S. soldier who helped start the gazebo pantry with a chaplain. “We are resilient because we know how to come together, and we know how to help each other.”

A food pantry in the gazebo next to the chapel on Patch Barracks in Stuttgart, Germany, offers a fresh produce pop-up stand a couple of days a week. (Erin Henderson)

The gazebo next to the chapel on Patch Barracks in Stuttgart, Germany, houses a new food pantry open 24 hours. It’s one of four new food pantries in the Stuttgart military community. (Erin Henderson)