Virginia’s budget surplus will fund a state-level replacement for the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program should the federal government shutdown continue into November, Gov. Glenn Youngkin announced Tuesday.

Dubbed Virginia Emergency Nutrition Assistance, or VENA, the newly-created program is expected to send money to SNAP beneficiaries’ Electronic Benefit Transfer cards starting on Nov. 3.

SNAP typically helps low-income earners and people who can’t work afford groceries. But the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which oversees the program, has told states to pause payments until further notice, starting Nov. 1. The federal government has been shut down since the beginning of October as members of Congress failed to agree on annual appropriations bills and several attempts a

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