Colorado SNAP cards are set to keep buying soda on Oct. 30, the date the state’s soft-drink ban was supposed to begin. A federal court threw out the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s approval of the ban in June, and the order says the waiver “may not proceed.”
What Colorado planned
Colorado asked USDA to change what counts as eligible food under SNAP, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, so that it would exclude “soft drinks” as defined in Colorado law, section 39-26-707 of the state statutes. USDA’s Colorado waiver page shows the approval letter is dated Aug. 4, 2025, for a two-year period starting March 1, 2026.
The ban did not start on schedule. The page says that on May 11, 2026, USDA approved the state’s request to move the implementation date from April 30, 2026 to Oct. 30, 2026. The ban never took effect.
What the court ordered
On June 22, 2026, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia ruled in Aragon et al. v. Rollins et al., case number 1:26-cv-00861. According to USDA’s page, the court “ordered that FNA’s approval of the waiver be vacated and that the waiver’s implementation may not proceed.” FNA is the federal Food and Nutrition Administration, the part of USDA that runs SNAP.
The judge was Amy Berman Jackson, according to FoodNavigator-USA. Plaintiffs were SNAP recipients in five states. She ruled that Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins exceeded her authority. The same order vacated waivers in Iowa, Nebraska, Tennessee and West Virginia.
For a Colorado household on SNAP, the question is whether the card can still buy soda after Oct. 30. Under the order, the soft-drink limit cannot go forward, so the card works for soda as it did before. The rest of the program is untouched. Benefit amounts, the monthly deposit and the renewal rules are all the same.
The Oct. 30 soda ban will not change what Colorado SNAP cards buy, but the program’s renewal and reporting dates still do. The SNAP & Medicaid Renewal Organizer has a Colorado state pack among its 51 and a renewal and reporting calendar.
Get the Colorado pack and renewal calendar in The SNAP & Medicaid Renewal Organizer →
What happens next
USDA is appealing. The University of Arkansas Cooperative Extension Service reported in a Sept. 8 news item that USDA filed a notice of appeal of the ruling. The item did not say whether any part of the ruling is paused while the appeal goes forward, and it did not mention a stay.
USDA’s Colorado page, updated Sept. 18, lists no notice newer than the June 22 order and the May 11 date change. Agriculture Secretary Rollins responded to the ruling by saying, “An activist judge just blocked our commonsense restriction on using SNAP benefits for soda and junk,” according to FoodNavigator-USA.
So the legal position is simple on paper. The approval is vacated, the waiver cannot go forward, and an appeal is pending in federal court. Anything that changes that would have to come from the appeals court or from USDA.
Colorado is one of five
The order covers Colorado, Iowa, Nebraska, Tennessee and West Virginia. USDA’s master list of food-restriction waivers, updated Oct. 2, shows 23 states in all and puts the same court-order language on Colorado, Iowa, Tennessee and West Virginia. Elsewhere the limits go ahead. The same list shows Montana, North Dakota, Ohio, South Carolina and Virginia starting Nov. 1.
That matters for SNAP households that cross borders. A Colorado card used in a state where a restriction is in force follows that state’s rules at the register.
Keeping SNAP in order through the appeal
A court fight over soda does not touch the paperwork that decides whether benefits keep arriving. Colorado households still have to complete their recertification on time and report changes when the program requires it. The state’s county human services offices handle those steps, and the USDA waiver page is the place to look for any change to the soft-drink order.
Writing down the dates that apply to the household in one place helps: the recertification month, any interim report and the date the notice says benefits end if nothing is filed. If the appeal ever changes the picture, a household that has its dates in order can react to it without also scrambling over a missed renewal.
The soda ban is blocked; the renewal dates are not
A Colorado household can watch the court case closely and still lose benefits by missing a recertification. The SNAP & Medicaid Renewal Organizer walks through SNAP recertification and gives a renewal and reporting calendar, plus a Colorado pack among its 51 state packs.
Put the Colorado SNAP renewal dates on one calendar with the Renewal Organizer →
This article was produced with AI assistance and edited for accuracy against the sources linked above.
