Vermont is poised to backfill at least 15 days of Snap benefits as the federal shutdown continues.

Plus, a look at a program that works to elect more Democratic women in the state.

And this comes as a new poll indicates the majority of Vermonters would support Republican Governor Phil Scott in the 2026 election.

All that and more ahead on Vermont this week.

From the Vermont public studio in Winooski.

This is Vermont this week, made possible in part by the Lintilhac Foundation and Milne Travel.

Here's moderator Mitch Wertlieb.

Good evening, and thank you for joining us.

I'm Mitch Wertlieb.

It's Friday, October 31st.

Happy Halloween to everyone who celebrates.

And on today's panel, we are joined by Lola Duffort from Vermont Public Hannah Bassett from Seven Days and Mark Johnson with WCAX.

Thank you all so much for being here.

And we're going to dive in.

Immediately to a story that has made national headlines all across the country.

And this has to do with the for with Snap benefits, Vermont was poised to take a really active role in making sure that folks did not lose those benefits.

Federal government was going to shut those off.

We have some breaking news, though, about this.

Now, apparently, there's been an injunction to try and stop this.

What do we know right now about what's happening with these Snap benefits?

Right.

So, you know, the federal government had said, well, because of the federal shutdown, shut down, we, cannot continue paying for Snap benefits, which is America's largest anti-hunger program.

One inch, one inch ten Vermonters rely on this program, right?

Like that is 60,000 people 60,000 people just in Vermont.

So the federal government said we are going to stop paying for benefits on November 1st.

That is this Saturday because of this shutdown.

And so states across the country were scrambling to figure out what to do.

And Vermont decided to, basically pay for benefits out of pocket, at least for the next 15 days and said, that's what we're going to do.

We're going to pay for at least two weeks worth of benefits.

It's going to cost us $6 million.

The governor and legislative leaders agreed on this this week.

However, Vermont also joined a multi-state lawsuit against the Trump administration.

For, its decisio to not pay for these benefits.

And it argued you have emergency funding that is available to pay for this sort of thing in the event of a shutdown.

And you should be using that money.

A federal judge today agreed with those states, including Vermont, and said you have to tap into those.

It told the federal government you must tap into those that to those emergency moneys to pay for this benefit.

I thin the bottom line for Vermonters is that if you rely on these benefits, you are going to retain access to them, at leas for the next two weeks, either because the feds will be forced thanks to this lawsuit, to pay for this money, or because, Vermont has pledged to pay for it.

We should also note, and this is really important, that whether it's Vermont paying for it or the feds, you could have actually, like, trouble using your debit card for the first few days because of some complicated technological kinks.

I will not get into.

But that money will eventually be available to you.

At least two weeks worth.

Yeah.

What we're hearing is that a New York Times is reporting that, the federal judge that you mentioned is giving the Trump administration until Monday, I guess, to say, look, are you going to pay these benefits or not?

We're saying you have to do that now.

But as you're saying, yes, one way or another, these, benefits will be paid for at least two weeks for Vermonters who really rely on them.

Vermont was taking a pretty active role in this.

I know other states were saying like, well, we're gonna we're gonna give money to food banks, but we're not going to, like, fund these benefits themselves.

Right?

Vermont was taking extra stuff.

Yeah, Vermont was being, more generous than other states.

It was digging deeper to do this.

It is also allocating.

It was also allocating about $250,000 to the Vermont Food Bank.

Because we are anticipating, additional need, especially because even if, benefits are funded, they might be inaccessible for a little bit.

And so, you know, people need to eat now.

Yeah.

And so, yeah, no, I mean, Vermont is taking a more generous, approach.

We should note, though, that, you know, whether or not it's the governor or its legislative leaders, everyone is saying we put money aside for this sort of situation, but we do not have enough money to do this indefinitely.

Right.

Lawmakers had schedule and the governor had scheduled a meeting for two weeks from now, right, to see.

Okay, should we renew this for another 15 days if th government is still shut down?

And so, you know, it was possible, probably likely that they would have renewed it if necessary.

But you start looking out further and things look pretty dicey.

And one more thing on this, Lola, real quick, if Vermont had to use this money, as you were saying, in this emergency level, there's no guarantee that they'd be reimbursed eventually by the federal government, right?

That's correct.

Both legislative leaders and Scott, Governor Scott said, you know, we are spending this mone and we are assuming we are not going to get it back.

And that's why they're, you know, scared about, renewed ING, this benefit, the state funded benefit indefinitely or making any sort of promises to that effect.

Right.

Because, we'd run out of cash pretty quickly.

Well, I guess I would sort of call this goodish news, right?

Market.

But in a way, I think it's also encouraging to see how many Vermonters have really stepped up the number of places where food banks are being supplied by Vermonters.

But, you know, it just there's something that is really galling I think, to people about this, that people that are on this nutrition program are this is really representative of how poisonous things have gotten down in Washington, D.C., where you have Republicans and Democrats pointing their finger at one another saying, you're responsible for people on this program not getting their benefits.

And, you know, as you mentioned, I mean, you got one out of eight, one out of ten people in this country that are the richest country in the world that are depending on this program, getting about $350 a month.

I mean, I don't know about you, but that seems like an inadequate amount of money as it is anyway.

But to be caught in the middle of this, you know, political crossfire is just really reprehensible.

It's a difficult situation for sure.

But Lola, thank you so much for bringing us up to speed on that.

And again, right now it does look like, at least for the next 15 days, Vermonters will be able to access those benefits.

I want to turn to a story now about another, political situation in Vermont where a Republican senator has resigned.

He is stepping down.

His name is Larry Hart, Orange County state senator.

Very different situation.

Mark Johnson, then what happened with, Samuel Douglas, of course, resigning amid great controversy.

What is Larry Hart saying about why he's stepping down?

Well, this is really this is kind of a sad story.

Larry Hargis was elected to the state Senate.

He beat Mark McDonald, who had been in the legislature total of 33 years, 22 of them in the Vermont Senate.

Very liberal Democrat down in Orange County.

You know, Larry's back story is tragic.

And every parent's worst nightmare.

In 2016, his 28 year old daughter, who was eight months pregnant at the time, died of an opioid overdose.

And Larry ran in part because of that.

And he has decided that it was just too much and didn't feel as though he was really able to accomplish anything.

I mean, I think to expect that you're going to get an awful lot accomplished in your first year down there might have been too high an expectation.

But he said, you know, in terms of his health and just his emotional and physical health, this was just too much for him to for him to take on.

One thing I did notice that he said in resigning, he is going to work on addiction issues in Vermont moving forward, because obviously, as you said, this is something that's very close to his heart.

Well, and he and he has been for, you know, for since his daughter passed away.

Yeah.

Well, what this does do is, you know, these are now two Republican, state senators who have resigned.

This opens up an opportunity for Vermont Democrats to perhaps win those seats back.

We know about all about the red wave that happened in the last election cycle.

And.

Bastard, I want to turn to you.

The really fascinating story you wrote about, kind of profiled this group emerge.

And this is a group that helps female Democrats get elected in Vermont.

What did you learn about them and how are they feeling now about opportunities like, like these, where they could possibly get some Democrats backing all of this emerge?

Vermont has been, established here in the state since 2013, when former Governor Madeleine Kunin established the program here.

It's a state affiliate of a national group called Emerge America that, as you said, is, designed to recruit and train women Democratic candidates to run for public office.

Here in Vermont, since its founding in 2013, it has trained over 230 women in its kind of core programs.

And in the state legislature in particular, it has, kind of it's touch on, more than half of the Democratic women who are now, serving in the state legislature.

So the program is still, you know, recruiting and training candidate.

So there's no doubt that they have their eyes set on the next election.

And these seats are, I'm sure, not, excluded from that.

They've been pretty successful, as you said, they started in 2013.

Right?

I mean, I think we can put some numbers up and and talk about this, but, as you're seeing there, you know, in 2016, sort of 54%, success rate.

62 now in 2025.

Yeah.

Over the past decade or so, the representation of Democratic women in the state legislature in particular, those are not percentages.

I got to correct myself.

There's a numbers, but so what's up on the screen is, raw numbers of, of individuals serving in the state legislature.

So you can see it's out of 180, which is the total number of folks who serve in Vermont's General Assembly.

Over the past decade, the share of Democratic women who have served, who serve in the state legislature has increased by about 10%.

In the same amount of time, the share of women in the Republican Party in the General Assembly has declined by about 7%.

And that's, you know, interesting in particular in the last couple of years and that that is, you know, occurring at the same time that the Republican Party has actually made gains.

So there's of course, so many different factors at play with politics at any given time.

There's societal shifts, political shifts.

But the political science researchers who I spoke with, the folks here in Vermont credited emerge, with a lot of the Democrats women's gains in this regard.

What did you learn about that?

You mentioned the training they train these women to, to run for office.

And what kind of things do they sort of guide them through?

The training is focused on running for office.

So it includes how to canvass, how to develop a platform, how to give a stump speech.

But a lot of the women who've gone through the program also really emphasized how it's the relationships and the mentorship that the network offers that, really gives them a leg up.

Some of the folks who've gone through the program are names that, viewers and listeners might recognize.

Your representative, Becca Ballen attorney general Charity Clark, House Speaker John Krasinski, these are all folks who either have led the program or have gone through the program themselves so they, you know, serve as, kind of, models, if not mentors to these women who are looking to enter a space that statistically is still, very much a male dominated space.

Yeah.

I'm sure at some point the emerge would love to see another female governor be elected in Vermont.

We've only had one in the state's history, and that is Madeline Kunin, who, as you say, helped found the program.

It's really interesting stuff.

Great article for you to check out in seven days, on emerge.

And this moves us now to, a really interesting poll that came out, Mark Johnson, out of, unh, I believe in the sport.

And they're kind of looking at like, all right, let's look ahead to the next election cycle as polls like to do.

Sometimes I find that a little annoying because you're speculating so much.

But we know that Governor Phil Scott, a Republican in a very blue state, is very popular here.

Do the numbers of this latest poll indicate that he is still quite popular?

He has had some of the highest numbers in the country.

He's either first or second most popular in the country is a 61% approval rate.

And that, you know, after the amount of time that he's been in office, that's phenomenal.

Because usually your numbers go down the longer you serve.

You know, I think the real question here is, is he going to run?

And that's an open question.

He has somehow gotten away with this mantra that he has where he says, why I don't announce until after the end of the legislative session, which of course really boxe in anybody who's his opponent.

He actually announced in September of 2015 that he was going to run for the open seat in 2016.

He announced the next cycle in March.

So, you know, the way he's able to sort of hold his opponents at bay and the challenge that that really creates is if you're a mike check or a charity clerk, the two names that are really talked about is Democrats who might run.

You know, you've got to make a decision soon, because in this day and age, it's going to cost you a million bucks plus to run an effective campaign in Vermont.

So they're going to have to make a decision before Phi Scott likely makes a decision.

And, you know, the reality is, the other thing that this poll shows that really jumps out is the number of people you know, we all know who Mike paycheck is and charity clerk is.

But the reality is that most Vermonters have no opinion about them.

So they've got an enormous amount of work to do to get to become household names, particularly if Phil Scott runs again.

And, you know, frankly, the challenge that they're going to have if he decides to run, I think is going to be pretty high, even though this is a very blue state.

Phil Scott has distanced himself from Donald Trump.

He's never voted for Donald Trump.

He's been very critical of Donald Trump.

I think, you know, he's made some decisions that liberals are unhappy about.

But, you know, on some of the key ones, I mean, for example, he said no twice to Trump's request for member of the Vermont National Guard.

Had he said yes to that, that would have created a wide, you know, opening for a Democrat to run.

But I think, you know, he's a he's a very popular guy.

Sure everybody could find something about him to criticize, but the the numbers that he has, even among Democrats, I mean, he's only slightly behind within this poll.

When you dive deeper into the numbers, you know, Mike Peacock among Democrats is only slightly ahead of hi in terms of Democrats who want my check to run or want Phil Scott to run.

So if he decides what a hill it is to climb, really.

But and, you know, incumbency in Vermont has always been the stock in trade.

I mean, I the last incumbent that was knocked off was was quite a while ago.

Well, you know, seven days.

I actually just wrote an interesting article about this.

Your colleague Kevin McCallum was saying, you know, the tightrope that that Phil Scott has to walk.

Yes.

He wants to keep his head down a little bit, when it comes to Donald Trump.

But then other times, like with the snap lawsuit, for example, you know, he was right behind that.

He did take a hit, a Governor Scott, a little bit, when he gave the information about Snap recipients, you know, personal sensitive information, just handed it over to the federal government.

Like, Chuck was very, vocal in his opposition to that.

But again, the numbers are not showing a huge dent in Scott's popularity.

Is that fair to say due to that?

Yeah.

And and I think, you know, he had a pretty reasonable explanation on that, that that was information.

It's a federal program.

There are probably going to have to give it over anyway.

I mean, Phil Scott is a is a tactical person.

He is going to pick and choose which battles.

You know, what hell am I going to die on?

And, you know, he's also agreed to extend the Ice detention program in the Vermont prisons.

You know, people were unhappy.

Some people were unhappy about that.

You know, his argument is I'd rather have those prisoners, particularly if they're Vermonters closer to home than sent off to God only knows where.

I thought one of the most interesting lines that Kevin had in this story, which is a good story, was he quoted a, political analyst, who said that they were surprised that Phil Scott was sort of walking this tightrope and that he was being oddly cautious, considering that he's a race car driver.

And I thought, you know, you do not understand Phil Scott.

Phil Scott is the winningest racecar driver at Thunder Road.

And it's not because he's reckless and it's because he's pragmatic.

And I remember writing a profile about him and talking to Ken Squier, who owned Thunder Road, and he said, you know, Phil waits for the race to come to him, and his only goal really is to lead on the last lap.

He's not weaving in and out of traffic all the time.

He's he's waiting to pick his spots.

And that's how we operate politically.

There's a lot of ways to win a race.

And Phil Scott is taking a very particular approach, as you're saying there.

And I should mention too, I think our viewers, our listeners probably already know this.

But Charity Clark, of course, is Vermont's attorney general and Mike Pejic is the state treasurer.

And, you know, don't count her out.

I mean, one of the things that's interesting is that she has been out in front on the news.

She's really the point person who has been filing all these lawsuits.

You know, her ability to become a household name, I think in some respects might be more than like paychecks.

Who everybody seems to think is the favorite.

But as I say, I think I think either one of them is they're going to make this move, are going to have to decide sooner than Phil Scott tips his head.

And of course, you know Phil Scott.

Why would he tip his hat before the end of the legislature and spend half the legislative session as a lame duck?

I mean, he'll get nothing done.

I'm going to move on to his story now, Lola, before that, you have been writing about and, you know, health care premiums are going to rise by seven 7% for school employees next year.

That doesn't sound great, but compared to what it has been in the past and what it could be, this is kind of good news.

Yeah.

In this era, we cheer for 7% increases, which is crazy.

Not good.

Yeah.

And that's, you know, we're seeing, relatively modest increases across the board when it comes to ra premiums in Vermont this year.

And when I say, you know, relatively modest, I mean 7 to 10%, which, only feels good relative to other things.

And that's because of, action that lawmakers took, last session that really, that hemmed in drug prices in hospitals.

And it's also thanks to, what the Green Mountain Care Board has been doing also with hospital prices.

And then this was, this was an also has been really interesting to me.

A lot of insurers, the two major commercial insurers in Vermont and also the state funded pool that insurers, teachers in this case have all announced the decision that they will not be paying for GLP ones next year.

That's ozempic that class of drugs, for weight loss alone.

Right.

So if you if you have diabetes, they'll still pay for it.

But if you're just trying to lose weight, they won't.

And that these drugs are so expensive, so expensive that that one move is going to shave multiple percentage points off of premiums next year.

When it comes to school employees, we're not for that decision.

Instead of 7%, we'd be looking at 11%.

That's fascinating.

Which is wild.

On the subject of healt care premiums, yes, obviously, open enrollment for Affordable Care Act plans, ACA plans, Obamacare, start this Saturday.

Tomorrow.

That.

Yes.

That's tomorrow.

Oh my gosh that's yeah.

That just sort of struck me there.

Yeah.

As anyone who's paying any attention to Washington will know, you know, enhanced subsidies that we're helping people afford.

These premiums are expiring at the end of the year.

And so a lot of people are probably going to get sticker shock.

This is wha the federal shutdown was, all.

This is what the federal shutdown is all about.

Democrats continue to say that they are, you know, not voting to reopen the government until we extend extend, extend those in subsidies.

But right now, there's no deal on that.

And so the status quo is those subsidies are expiring.

You know, I talked to, navigators, folks who are helping to connect people to navigate this process.

And their message is start researching.

Now, the numbers may be scary, but please look at them.

Don't automatically get re enrolled in a plan you can't afford.

And also, you know, some people are looking at pretty catastrophic situations financially, right?

Where they're premiums could double, triple, quadruple.

But not everyone is looking at that scenario.

And so they also want people to not despair in advance and decide that they won't be able to afford coverage and to look at, you know, there's a plan comparison tool, go online, look at your situation, actually understand how this impacts you because the impacts are highly variable.

This is why open enrollment is so important.

You're saying it's happening tomorrow and it starts tomorrow.

And the deadline to enroll in a plan, without a lapse in coverage is December 15th.

Thank you so much for that update.

Lola.

Mark Johnson, I want to turn to you, that Governor Scott has unveiled a plan to tackle publi safety concerns in Burlington.

This has been a big issue.

We've been talking about this for a while.

Can you give me sort of the the main bullet points of what his plans are?

What are some of th big things people will notice?

Well, the big one I think you've already talked about before, which is this alternativ court which is going to try to get at some of the 60 or so serious repeat offenders.

One of the biggest issues in Burlington has been that people who are charged with the crime, because of the way the bail laws are written, unless it's a violent crime, are getting back out on the street committing another crime, and the courts are really backed up.

I mean, you know, people criticize that.

Shouldn't the county prosecutor, she's had a number of murder cases.

But what the criminals have figured out is that the longer that you can wait, the better the plea bargain deal that you're likely to be offered.

So this court that has bee now established and will be up and running pretty soon is going to try to get at that and sort of build some more accountability into the system.

You know, it's a 14 point plan, of course.

Vermont, the 14 state Phil Scott number 14 on his race car.

You know, there's a there's a number of other things in there, some less important than the others.

There'll be more treatment available inside the prison.

There's going to be a mobil unit that's going to also help with drug treatment.

As your colleague Courtney Linden, I think, correctly pointed out, not really anything in there about helping those who are homeless.

And that is a real bone of contention with the ending of the the hotel and motel voucher program.

But I think the bottom line on this is that the squabbling seems to be over now, which was quite unproductive between the mayor and the governor.

You know whose fault it was that Burlington was having a problem.

Burlington is the largest city in this state of of in this state needs, you know, support.

It's the economic engine in this whole well, you know, going back to the 2020 vote, I mean, that was five years ago now.

And for, you know, the mayor to say, well, the state's doing nothing.

I mean, it's so now this i it seems now that there's been the bickering is ended and they're now actually pulling in this same direction, which I think is what people really wanted more than anything.

Okay.

Thank you for giving us an update on that story.

And just before we go I want to mention that, a name some of Rogers may be familiar with, Tasha Wallace.

She is the executive director of the Moyle County Planning Commission.

She also used to work for governor, Dean and former Governor Jim Douglas.

She's also the winner of last week's New Yorker caption cartoon contest.

I was very impressed with her caption.

So congratulations to Tasha Wallace for winning that.

And, you should check it out.

It's pretty funny.

She did a good job there.

We're going to have to leave it there for today.

I want to thank our panel so very much.

Did you won that contest?

Oh, I hate to brag about myself, but yes, I am a forme winner of that contest myself.

Thank you.

Mark Johnson.

Hanneh Bassett with Seven Days And Lola Duffort from VermontPublic.

Im Mitch Wertlieb.

Yes, I did once win the New Yorker capture cartoon contest, but that's not important.

Tune in for Vermont This Week, next week.

In the meantime, I hope you have a great week.

Thank you for mentioning that.

That's really nice to get -