Nebraska filed a new SNAP food restriction waiver request with USDA on September 1, 2026, and the agency says it is still working on a response. Until USDA answers, the limit on soda and energy drinks that started January 1 has no federal approval behind it, because a federal court vacated that approval on June 22. For a Nebraska shopper, candy is not blocked and soda is returning store by store.
USDA has a Nebraska request on its desk and no answer yet
USDA’s Nebraska waiver page says that on Sept. 1, 2026 the state submitted a new SNAP Food Restriction Waiver request. Its status line says USDA is working on a response. The page names no decision date and does not say what the new request changes from the first one.
USDA’s own headline on the May 2025 approval called Nebraska’s the first state waiver ever to restrict soda and energy drinks from food stamps. That made the state the test case, and its approval is the one a court has now set aside. USDA’s overview of food restriction waivers, updated October 13, lists 23 states with waivers, and the vacatur reaches only five of them.
The first request went in on April 14, 2025, and USDA approved it on May 19, 2025. Nebraska asked to modify that approval on April 23, 2026, and USDA signed off on the change on May 11, 2026. Six weeks after the second approval, the court order arrived.
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A new approval is the step that would let Nebraska restrict purchases again. Nothing on USDA’s page says it has been granted, so a shopper in Lincoln, Omaha or Kearney is dealing with a state that has asked and a federal agency that has not replied.
What the June 22 order took away
On June 22, 2026, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia ordered USDA’s approval of Nebraska’s waiver vacated, in Aragon et al. v. Rollins et al., case 1:26-cv-00861. USDA’s page quotes the order: “the waiver’s implementation may not proceed.” Colorado, Iowa, Tennessee and West Virginia were covered by the same order.
U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson found that USDA exceeded its authority, FoodNavigator-USA reported. She wrote that “the question is not what the agency thinks it should do but what Congress has said it can do.” The suit was brought by SNAP recipients in the five states, and the ruling left waivers in the other states in place.
Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins called the ruling the work of “an activist judge” that blocked a commonsense limit on using SNAP benefits for soda and junk, and USDA said it will not back down. The same report says an appeal to the D.C. Circuit is expected. The anti-hunger group FRAC told the outlet that Nebraska may face additional issues because it asked for another waiver while the case was pending.
None of that has produced a new ruling. The order stands, the refiled request is pending, and any appeal would be a separate track that Nebraska’s page does not mention.
Soda at the register depends on the store
Nebraska’s Department of Health and Human Services said in a July 2 notice that USDA had told it to act on the order. The department said it is working with SNAP retailers to remove the restrictions on soda and energy drinks. It added that “many retailers will require time to update their systems before the restrictions are lifted.”
No lift date appears in that notice or on the department’s healthy choices page. That page still carries the original wording: “As of January 1, 2026, soda, soft drinks, and energy drinks can no longer be purchased with SNAP benefits.” With no date, each retailer is changing over on its own schedule.
The practical result is uneven. A can of soda that the legal order allows may still be handled by a register that has not been updated, and the state asks households with questions to write to HealthSNAP@nebraska.gov. The state has not published a store list showing who has switched.
Candy was next on the list
Candy was never part of the January 1 restriction. The department’s page says that effective November 1, 2026, candy would no longer be purchasable with SNAP benefits, a date that is six days away. The order vacated the approval under which that second phase was set.
USDA’s page says the waiver may not proceed, and the state page does not say whether the November 1 candy date is still scheduled. Any candy limit would now depend on the pending request, so a Nebraska SNAP household can buy candy today.
For a shopper whose soda is declined at a register, the court order and the state’s July 2 notice are the facts to carry. Nebraska DHHS is the office handling the retailer changeover, and its HealthSNAP address is the place to report a store that has not updated. The department says it will post further details on its healthy choices page as they become available.
Benefit amounts did not change in any of this. The rulings and requests govern which items a card can pay for, not how much lands on it each month, and the deposit schedule is separate from the waiver fight.
Will Nebraska’s soda rules change again before the next SNAP renewal?
Purchase rules for Nebraska SNAP have moved three times in a year: restricted on January 1, vacated on June 22, and now refiled. A household that tracks shopping rules but misses a recertification or reporting date can lose benefits that no court order restores.
The SNAP & Medicaid Renewal Organizer includes a Nebraska state pack among its 51 state packs and a renewal and reporting calendar, with a renewal document checklist. Part 7 covers reporting changes and EBT problems, so the dates that keep a card funded sit beside the rule changes that decide what it buys.
Keep Nebraska SNAP renewal and reporting dates in the SNAP & Medicaid Renewal Organizer →
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This article was produced with AI assistance and edited for accuracy against the sources linked above.
