The U.S. Department of Agriculture, which administers the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, released guidance Thursday to states to proceed with . 

Child and nutrition advocates are glad to see it resume, but have concerns about the multiple steps needed to relaunch SNAP — particularly around states’ ability to quickly arrange payments through third-party vendors. 

Some 42 million Americans — including 16 million children, the elderly, veterans and those with disabilities — rely on SNAP for food.

“This is a unique situation,” said Claire Borzner, director for Share Our Strength and its No Kid Hungry campaign. “There has never before been a pause in SNAP payments or a recommendation for partial benefits.”

Borzner said states that issued incomplete payouts will need to ensure participants receive the remaining allotment.

The Trump administration first threatened to withhold SNAP benefits entirely for the month of November and then twice went to the U.S. Supreme Court in its legal quest to pay out only some benefits. It also moved to claw back money from states that went ahead and distributed 100% of benefits to their needy residents last week during a window of time when the USDA was authorizing it. 

SNAP benefits have historically not been cut off during prior shutdowns and President Donald Trump faced criticism that he tried to leverage Americans’ hunger— 1 in 8 receive SNAP benefits — to break Democrats’ opposition to ending the shutdown. 

Crystal FitzSimons, president at the Food Research & Action Center, said states are moving quickly to resume aid, though she understands some families might not feel relief until it arrives. 

“It is very fluid and moving in real time,” she said, speaking of getting the program up and running again. “The delays have created so much stress for the people who really need food on the table. I totally understand why they would be worried, but the shutdown has ended and as soon as people see the money in their card, they should be able to take a deep breath and move forward.”

But Melissa Boteach, chief policy officer at , an early childhood advocacy group, said “there has been a lot of undermining of the basic government infrastructure necessary” to get SNAP operational again. 

Boteach noted families have been suffering needlessly since the start of the month, making tough choices about whether to eat or pay rent and utility bills.  

“These are the conversations American families have been having around the kitchen table,” she said, calling SNAP a miracle and crediting it for preventing starvation-levels of hunger in this country since the 1970s. 

Part of the confusion about when the aid might arrive centers around the uneven distribution of benefits. Stewart Fried, a principal attorney at OFW Law in Washington, D.C., and an expert on SNAP, said 19 states have already issued full November payments — the ones the administration told to “undo” those actions after the fact — while another 18 delivered partial allotments. 

Fried, who has represented many SNAP-eligible retailers on a wide variety of issues before the , Congress and in the federal courts, said states that issued partial payouts might need at least a week to disperse the remaining monies. The 13 states that sent out no money in November may face the easiest turnaround time.

“For states that have not issued any November benefits, that process should be quicker and benefits will hopefully be issued in the next few days,” he said. 

Meanwhile, low-income families have been across the country all month while also relying on schools to help fill the nutrition gap for their kids, child advocates say. 

Ian Coon, spokesman for the Alliance for Education, an independent, local education fund that supports Seattle Public Schools, said his group set aside $150,000 for grocery store gift cards in October. The school community raised an additional $70,000 in recent weeks to bridge any further gaps as kids head home for the holidays, some to empty cupboards.

The alliance has already distributed $154,000 in funding for kids and families in need.

“There have been increased donations to food pantries,” he said. “Nearly every local business has a food collection bin in the door and restaurants are still providing community meals or fundraising. This isn’t the time to standby. It’s the time to act and we’re so grateful to have the support of our community.”

Erika Roberson, senior policy associate at The Institute for College Access & Success, a research and advocacy group that addresses issues like food insecurity in secondary education, said she’s glad for the 1.1 million college undergraduates who rely on SNAP. 

“When students receive their benefits, they will worry less about where their next meal will come from and will be able to focus on their studies,” she said, adding those who wrestle with food insecurity are more likely to struggle academically, taking on extra hours of work and leaving them less time to attend class. “It’s a huge disadvantage.”

SNAP benefits have been ensured for a full year and therefore won’t be subject to disruption when to fund the government that was approved this week runs out in January. Recipients also still face the effects of the $186 billion eliminated from SNAP as part of the administration’s landmark signed into law this summer.

Borzner called the most recent chaos around SNAP a manufactured crisis. 

“Families should not have had to go through this pain,” she said, adding that the government had the resources to pay benefits in full. “This program could have continued to operate for November as it normally does. None of this needed to happen.”

The Trump administration that issued full food assistance benefits to their needy residents to “undo” those actions. Officials in more than full Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits on Friday before the U.S. Supreme Court halted that action late in the day.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Nov. 8 notice that it wants those SNAP funds taken back is the latest development in a chaotic legal fight playing out during the prolonged government shutdown. Advocates say the delays and ongoing uncertainty are causing severe hardship for the roughly 42 million Americans, including 16 million children, the elderly, veterans and those with disabilities, who rely on SNAP for food.

The states are now warning of “catastrophic operational disruptions,” according to , if the federal government does not reimburse them for the money sent to recipients before the high court’s temporary stay was issued and while the USDA was telling states that it “will complete the processes necessary” on Friday to make full SNAP funding available to them.

President Donald Trump initially threatened to withhold SNAP benefits entirely for the month of November and then agreed to release partial benefits — first putting that number at 50% and then raising it to 65% — only after being successfully sued by two groups of plaintiffs, including more than 20 states, the District of Columbia and three governors and a coalition of cities, religious groups and nonprofits. The coalition plaintiffs then returned to court to argue that the federal government should be required to fully fund SNAP and a federal judge in Rhode Island agreed, ordering the administration to do so Thursday.

The administration appealed the order to the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and when it did not get quick action, petitioned the Supreme Court for a temporary stay. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson . The move gives the circuit court in Boston more time to decide whether the lower court was correct in ordering the Trump administration to not only tap into contingency money set aside to keep SNAP going during government emergencies, but other funding sources needed to deliver benefits at 100%.

More than 42 million Americans who rely on federal food assistance — 16 million of them children — will apparently get their full benefits this month, according to a U.S. Department of Agriculture memo sent to states Friday.

The , obtained by several news outlets, was the latest pendulum swing in an ongoing legal battle over whether the Trump administration will be forced to fund the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program during the government shutdown.

Lawyers for the administration went before an appeals court Friday to try and overturn an order issued a day earlier by U.S. District Court Judge John McConnell saying it must provide full SNAP benefits by Friday. 

While Patrick Penn, the deputy undersecretary of Food, Nutrition and Consumer Services, was informing states that the USDA “will complete the processes necessary to make funds available,” according to the memo, President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance were voicing their opposition to complying with the federal court. 

Vanced because “you have a federal judge effectively telling us what we have to do in the midst of a Democrat government shutdown.” Trump cited the country’s need to remain “very liquid” in the event of “catastrophes, wars” as a reason why the funding would not be forthcoming.

Gina Plata-Nino, the SNAP program director at , condemned the back-and-forth and the larger dispute that has left vulnerable children and families hanging in the balance.

“It is unconscionable that the administration is using 42 million Americans as chess pieces that are going hungry,” she said. “Retailers rely on these benefits, and communities and states are being forced to step up, all because the president is holding back food assistance to use as leverage in ending the government shutdown.”

While the administration was pushing the federal appeals court for a decision by 4 p.m. Friday, several hours later none had been issued. It was unclear what the president might do if the appeals court ruled in its favor. 

Advocates say the continuing legal dispute is wreaking havoc. 

“This is absolutely devastating,” said Erika Roberson, senior policy associate at The Institute for College Access & Success, a research and advocacy group that addresses issues like food insecurity in secondary education. “Food should not be politicized: Everyone has a human right to food.” 

McConnell also said on Thursday that with his previous order to fund SNAP. 

The government agreed last week to a partial payout using U.S. Department of Agriculture contingency monies, but the judge said it must tap $4 billion in additional resources to ensure families receive their full November allotment. 

“People have gone without for too long,” McConnell said . 

Ian Coon, spokesman for the Alliance for Education, an independent, local education fund that supports Seattle Public Schools, called the judge’s initial and subsequent orders to fund SNAP a critical win for families. 

“Our kids can’t continue to lose when adults don’t get along,” he said. “The uncertainty and distrust this has already sown will last a while and we are worried about what it will take to get this life-altering benefit back up and running in full.”

His group created an emergency food aid plan that would distribute up to $100 in gift cards to assist families in need. 

“As an organization committed to advancing educational outcomes,” he added, “we know that students cannot focus on learning when they are hungry or when families are forced to make impossible choices between groceries, rent, and other essentials.”

The USDA announced earlier this week that SNAP recipients would receive , up from an estimate of 50% last week. The greater percentage came after Trump to say he would defy the court order and halt SNAP altogether until the government reopened. The White House press secretary later walked back those comments. 

Friday’s memo was the first indication that the government was willing to fully fund SNAP during what is now the longest government shutdown in history. SNAP benefits have historically not been cut off during prior shutdowns.

Trump’s landmark , signed into law this summer, eliminated $186 billion from SNAP. Eligibility requirements also grew more stringent, which affects the number of students who automatically qualify for free and reduced-price meals at school and the number of schools that can offer universal free meals to all their students. 

currently provide universal school meals. Voters in Colorado this week approved two ballot measures to preserve the state’s free school meals program, including one that will .

The White House said Tuesday afternoon that the administration would partially fund the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program that feeds some 42 million Americans, including 16 million children, hours after President Donald J. Trump threatened to withhold the money and defy a court order.

Multiple news outlets reported that press secretary Karoline Leavitt , saying the administration would comply with last week’s ruling that it could not cut off all funding to the federal food assistance program known as SNAP .

On Truth Social Tuesday morning, Trump wrote: “SNAP BENEFITS, which increased by Billions and Billions of Dollars (MANY FOLD!) during Crooked Joe Biden’s disastrous term in office (Due to the fact that they were haphazardly ‘handed’ to anyone for the asking, as opposed to just those in need, which is the purpose of SNAP!), will be given only when the Radical Left Democrats open up government, which they can easily do, and not before!”

The president’s post sparked anger and confusion among advocates Tuesday, who said they’ve been working with the federal government to get the critical aid flowing. Gina Plata-Nino, interim director for SNAP at the Food Research & Action Center, called Trump’s apparent reversal on providing partial funding cruel and intentionally harmful to needy families.

“He has to follow the law,” she said of the president. “The agencies are already working on this. USDA [U.S. Department of Agriculture] already agreed to comply and issued the memo guidance form last night.”

Last week, two federal judges ruled that the Trump administration could not withhold SNAP funding. The government then agreed to a partial payment using contingency monies, but said it would not tap other sources to fully cover the food assistance program. Advocates say families can expect to receive just 50% of their typical allotment for the month of November. And it’s unclear when the aid will arrive.

Meanwhile, multiple outlets reported Tuesday that one of those judges, U.S. District Judge John McConnell of Rhode Island, has to consider a new motion that would force the USDA to provide the full $8 billion needed for November benefits.

Two federal judges on Friday ruled against President Donald Trump’s move to suspend food stamp benefits starting Nov. 1 amid the month-long government shutdown, with each noting contingency funding is available. 

It’s unclear if the Trump administration plans an appeal or how quickly food assistance can flow to the 42 million Americans who rely on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. Sixteen million of them are children, putting pressure on schools to address their needs.

U.S. District Judge of Rhode Island ordered the U.S. Department of Agriculture to distribute the funds in a timely manner using contingency money. 

“SNAP benefits have never, until now, been terminated,” McConnell “And the United States has in fact admitted that the contingency funds are appropriately used during a shutdown, and that occurred in 2019.”

In a separate ruling, U.S. District Judge of Massachusetts gave the Trump administration until Monday to decide whether it will provide at least some food stamp benefits to recipients. She indicated the suspension of SNAP benefits is contrary to law. 

She found fault with the defendants’ assertion that the U.S Department of Agriculture is prohibited from funding SNAP because Congress has not enacted new appropriations for the current fiscal year.

“To the contrary, defendants are statutorily mandated to use the previously appropriated SNAP contingency reserve when necessary and also have discretion to use other previously appropriated funds,”  

Despite the judges’ rulings, many advocates say some kids will go hungry in November because the process for obtaining the aid consists of multiple steps — some of which have already been missed for those who receive help at the start of every month. 

On Oct. 28, more than 20 states, the District of Columbia, and three governors for suspending November’s SNAP benefits. They called the move unprecedented and illegal.

“SNAP is one of our nation’s most effective tools to fight hunger, and the USDA has the money to keep it running,” New York Attorney General Letitia James, with the president, said in a statement. “There is no excuse for this administration to abandon families who rely on SNAP, or food stamps, as a lifeline. The federal government must do its job to protect families.”

Gina Plata-Nino, interim director for SNAP at the Food Research & Action Center, said her organization encouraged the USDA to tap into its contingency and reserve funds to save children and families from going hungry. By refusing this opportunity, at least some recipients will likely miss their allotment. 

Plata-Nino said states were directed by federal officials on Oct. 10 to stop reporting critical data — a list of household eligibility and food stamp allocation — information they send directly to electronic benefit transfer contractors, who are key in distributing the aid. 

“Even in the best-case scenario, if the judge says, ‘We rule in your favor and we demand that this happens right now,’ and the Trump administration doesn’t appeal … the process of getting benefits into recipients’ accounts would take time,” she said. 

Arlen Benjamin-Gomez, executive director of EdTrust New York, a statewide education policy and advocacy organization, said it’s clear that serious damage has already been done to what is an essential program. 

“We know from what has happened so far with this administration that when they make announcements like this, it does have a direct impact on programs and the ability to sustain them,” she said. “For example, there was an announcement of federal cuts to Head Start very early on in the administration, and the program actually shut down. It’s still recovering. So, we can’t predict the chaos that is spread by this most recent effort to cut benefits.”

Benjamin-Gomez praised New York for declaring a state of emergency on the matter: Gov. Kathy Hochul is committing an additional $65 million in new state funds for emergency food aid to support state food banks. But not all states will do the same.  

Ian Coon, spokesperson for Alliance for Education, an independent, local education fund that supports Seattle Public Schools, said his organization has already earmarked funding to bridge the gap for those in need. 

He said the Alliance decided in late October to fund $150,000 in gift cards to area food stores for families in crisis. He said school staff will help identify children in need and offer the assistance of $25, $50 or $100. The $150,000 comes from a reserve fund.  

“We are fully aware it’s not a long-term solution, but we needed to do something,” Coon said. 

Carolyn Vega, associate director of policy analysis for Share Our Strength, which runs No Kid Hungry, said her organization also does not predict an abrupt or smooth end to the suffering of American families who rely on these benefits. 

“We are not holding our breath for the money to start flowing today,” she said. “Kids can’t wait: Families have to eat every single day. We know from our extensive work with schools that teachers already see kids show up to school hungry on Monday mornings. We can only imagine how much worse that would be if a family came in and were expecting to see benefits on Saturday and they did not. It’s an unbelievable strain for food banks. We know that schools will be an important resource for many families, but they can’t fill in the gap.”

In fiscal year 2023, nearly 80% of SNAP households included either a child, an elderly person or a non-elderly individual with a disability, . About 39% of SNAP participants were children that year. 

A statement on the federal agency’s website blames Senate Democrats for the shutdown. 

“They can continue to hold out for healthcare for illegal aliens and gender mutilation procedures or reopen the government so mothers, babies, and the most vulnerable among us can receive critical nutrition assistance,” . 

The department declined to comment on the judges’ rulings.

April Perez was 22 years old when she had her first daughter. Enrolling in the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, commonly known as WIC, was a lifesaver. “With her being my first child,” she said, “I was still finding my way through motherhood.” The program helped her access healthy foods for her family, get formula when she wasn’t able to produce enough breastmilk to breastfeed her daughter, and even get a referral to sign up her daughter, now 4 years old, for health insurance.

WIC provides food, nutrition education, breastfeeding support, and health care referrals to low-income mothers and young children ages 5 and under. Perez said the benefits for formula and foods like milk, fruit and vegetables alleviated some of the financial pressure around her transition to motherhood. “I didn’t have to stress about whether I was going to feed her or not,” she said. The benefits also made it possible for Perez and her husband to save up for their own apartment and move out of the friend’s house they were staying in. 

Perez’s husband works long days in construction, but she doesn’t work due to a number of health issues. She has cerebral palsy, which makes it hard for her to stand, use her arms and hands, or sometimes even walk, and hydrocephalus. WIC benefits help keep her family afloat. Perez, who lives in Virginia, now has two more daughters, a 3-year-old and a 3-month-old, and all three of her children are enrolled in WIC. Her 3-year-old, who has been diagnosed with autism, is very particular about food given her sensory sensitivities, but Perez is able to get her plenty of milk, bananas and other foods she likes with her WIC benefits. “It gives me peace of mind for my kid,” she said. Her infant, meanwhile, needs a special formula because she has acid reflux, which she said would cost her $50 if she didn’t get it through WIC.

But the government shutdown has now put the WIC program at risk. Unlike Social Security, WIC isn’t an entitlement program, so it relies on Congress to appropriate money every year, but Congress wasn’t able to pass bills funding the government before the fiscal year lapsed on September 30. The program is on funds, operating mostly on a contingency fund of , which is , as the shutdown continues. 

Federal funds would likely have lasted just two weeks from the start of the shutdown, estimated Zoë Neuberger, a senior fellow at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Then on Oct. 7, the Trump administration it had found a “creative solution” to use tariff revenue to keep federal WIC funding flowing. In a briefing for Congressional staffers three days later, the administration said it would about $300 million in unused tariff revenue into WIC, allowing it to continue until the end of October.

After federal funding is gone, states will have to use their own money if they want to keep the program going and try to get the federal government to pay them back when it reopens. The administration recently sent states an email saying that if they use their own funds for WIC allowable purposes they may be reimbursed, according to Neuberger and the National WIC Association. But “there isn’t a guarantee” of reimbursement, Neuberger noted, and “it would be helpful to have assurances.” 

States have used their funds to keep WIC going in past shutdowns, and some plan to do so now. Colorado lawmakers a bill to fund the program for a month in the event of a shutdown, and the governors of and Montana have that they’ll keep their programs running for the near term. But not every state currently has that capacity.

While Mississippi not to disrupt benefits for current recipients, the state has suspended enrolling new ones. The Inter-Tribal Council of Nevada WIC, which serves Nevada’s Native tribes and is open to all of the state’s residents, announced that it would benefits starting on Oct. 9, but then unspent federal recovery funds that allowed it to stay open through the end of October. Similarly, Washington state officials they don’t have the money to keep WIC open, but also federal funding on Oct. 9 that allows the state program to keep operating through the end of the month. If the shutdown drags on longer than that, states in similar situations will either have to stop enrolling new families to stretch their funds or risk having to cut off benefits entirely.

Losing benefits would be devastating for parents like Ashely Gooden-Stewart, a mother of three from Texas. She first enrolled in WIC in 2014, when her first baby, who died as an infant, was born. She enrolled when each of her other children were born and is currently receiving benefits for her 1-year-old. Gooden-Stewart works remotely on a contract basis, but the work is seasonal and spotty. She said she doesn’t have any current projects and doesn’t expect to before the end of the month, but in order to get a full-time job she needs child care, which she cannot afford. 

WIC helps fill in the gaps. “Eggs is expensive, milk is expensive, life is expensive,” Gooden-Stewart said. Her family relies on getting those staples through the program. If these benefits dry up, “We would have to go with less,” she said. 

The educational aspects of WIC are also very valuable to her. She said the breastfeeding classes are “incredible” and the classes on child development milestones, which she currently attends, have been very useful. “Although I’ve been a mother for years, it’s different each time,” she said. She loves the cooking classes that are offered, which help her discover more ways to incorporate vegetables into her family’s meals. “It helps our family eat healthier,” she said, adding that losing access to these classes would be “detrimental.” 

The uncertainty of the shutdown itself may be disrupting benefits for some people by making them hesitate to enroll. “Just the news about a shutdown or WIC possibly being affected leads people to not get benefits that they need,” Neuberger noted. And even after the government eventually reopens, WIC’s future remains uncertain. The program still has to be funded for the next year, and it’s unclear if it will get enough money to keep operating as it has been. In his , President Trump called for a significant cut to WIC’s fruit and vegetable benefits, which would between 62% to 75% for 5.2 million participants, according to an analysis by the Center on Budget Policy and Priorities (CBPP). 

Although the Republican-led House proposed a smaller cut to the fruit and vegetable benefits in its latest appropriations bill, the proposal still calls for a reduction and doesn’t include enough funding to keep serving everyone that is likely to enroll over the next year. Under the proposal, recipients would see a reduction in their food benefits and states would have to turn away nearly a half million eligible families, according to a . The Senate Agriculture Appropriations , by contrast, fully funds WIC. Congressional Democrats, meanwhile, have a bill that would make WIC a mandatory program, sparing it from running out of money during a government shutdown or if enrollment surges more than expected.

There is also that if an agreement to reopen the government doesn’t include guardrails that ensure that the Trump administration actually spends the money Congress appropriates as is the law, WIC could be cut through measures the administration to withhold funding for other programs, such as impoundment and rescission. With higher enrollment from eligible families and rising food costs, WIC is in need of more funding than in past years to continue serving all eligible participants who enroll.

If WIC benefits are disrupted, Perez’s family will feel the impact immediately. “It scares me,” Perez said. Her family receives food stamps, but with food prices so high, “it only lasts me for one week,” she said. Perez knows she can’t work, and she doesn’t have child care, but she said that if WIC funding runs short in the shutdown, she might be forced to find some kind of job to make ends meet. The only alternative would be for her husband, who already works from 6 a.m. into the evening, to get a second job during night hours. She worries about how that would impact her children, especially her daughter with autism who doesn’t do well with change.

They might even have to move. Perez fears that if their WIC benefits are interrupted, her family may not be able to afford their monthly rent of $1,650 on top of utilities, internet and car payments. 

Growing up, Perez said she watched her parents go without food so she and her siblings could eat. WIC benefits have meant she hasn’t yet had to do the same. But that will change if WIC’s food benefits disappear. “The thought of that happening — and me having to do that for my kids — that hurts,” she said. “The thought of having to worry about that is scary. I don’t want to have to worry about if I’m going to be able to feed my kids or not.”

“[If] I wasn’t able to take care of my kids like I want to,” Perez said, “that would really make me disappointed in this country.”

The connection between nutrition and learning is undeniable, particularly in the earliest years, when children’s . Research has proven that hunger and food insecurity . There’s evidence that in the first 1,000 days of a child’s life can affect various elements of development and even change the structure of their brain. And researchers have suggested between household food insecurity in early childhood and kindergarten readiness. 

It’s difficult for a child who arrives at their school or child care program hungry to engage fully with educational activities, build relationships and develop the self-regulation skills essential for later academic success. CACFP addresses this fundamental barrier to learning by ensuring that children in child care programs and schools receive nutritious meals and snacks throughout the day, but the program is underused and unevenly accessed due to barriers including a lack of awareness among providers and administrative overload for participants.

indicates that among children from low-income families, CACFP participation can increase consumption of healthier foods. “If you compare centers that do participate in CACFP and those that don’t, the ones that are doing CACFP are oftentimes serving healthier meals because they have to have fruits, vegetables, whole grains [and foods with] reduced sugar and low sodium,” said Clarissa Hayes, deputy director of Child Nutrition Programs at the (FRAC). These requirements align with federal dietary guidelines and are regularly updated to reflect the latest nutritional science, she noted.

This nutritional quality has made CACFP “an indicator of quality when it comes to child care settings,” Hayes explained, because it demonstrates that programs are committed to supporting children’s overall well-being and development. 

The program helps kids “develop those healthy habits really early on,” said Alexia Thex, vice president of the , a national organization that supports the CACFP community. If children don’t build those habits when they’re very young, it’s extremely difficult to make changes through elementary, middle and high school.

CACFP operates through a reimbursement system in which eligible providers working in child care centers and family child care settings receive federal funding for serving meals that meet strict nutritional guidelines. Typically, providers use their own money to buy approved foods, which they prepare themselves, and then apply for reimbursement, but sometimes a program facilitates a contract for ordering and delivering prepared meals. Reimbursement levels are decided using a tiered system that was introduced in 1997. Providers serving children from low-income families receive higher reimbursements than those with children from more affluent families. 

Implementation varies from state to state. According to Thex, the reimbursement process is managed by various nonprofit in each state that are responsible for “maintaining program integrity while still getting tons of people fed and in all kinds of different areas.” These organizations also organize scheduled and surprise inspections to check in on how providers are using the funding. 

For many early learning programs, CACFP provides crucial financial support. Alethea Etinoff, who runs POC Learning Academy in Washington, D.C., has participated since 2013 and sees the program as beneficial on multiple levels. She uses the funding to cover the groceries needed to prepare healthy foods for the children in her program. “CACFP allows you to serve nutritious meals. I think it’s kind of fun because you get to introduce the kids to food that they may not get at home.” While her brussels sprouts received mixed reviews, she said the kids and families enjoy the exposure to a variety of options.

Early educators who participate with the program also gain valuable nutrition insights. “You don’t really think about how much sugar is in yogurt,” noted Etinoff. 

Despite its benefits, CACFP participation has declined significantly since 1997, primarily due to its administrative burden. The tiered system designed to direct resources to those most in need has created substantial paperwork requirements that many small providers find overwhelming. Consequently, 39% of eligible child care centers and 33% of eligible family child care homes do not participate, the National CACFP Association . 

In 2023, The association called for . “The paperwork has gotten a little bit crazy,” Thex contends. 

Rachel Bymun, who operates Luv Muffins Preschool and Child Care in Bay Point, California, described the daily reality: “The hardest part is having to track all the meals and having to plug that in every day for each one of the meals. And they’ve made the system so that if you don’t do it that day, you don’t get reimbursed for it.” Furthermore, she said, surprise CACFP inspections create an atmosphere of distrust. 

The process isn’t easy for providers. “If kids are in households that get SNAP, they’re automatically eligible for school meals,” Hayes explained. But that’s not the way it works with CACFP. The burden of eligibility falls on the provider, not the family — and many providers, who are already juggling multiple responsibilities may opt out due to time constraints and the complexity of the paperwork, which could jeopardize an important pathway to nutrition programs for families. 

The financial challenges are equally daunting. Many providers, particularly those in family child care settings, cannot access bulk purchasing discounts and must shop at local retailers. Meanwhile, reimbursement rates, while adjusted annually for inflation, do not justify increased administrative demands.

Janna Rodriguez, who runs Innovative Daycare Corp in Freeport, New York, said the reimbursements can feel paltry. “I’m spending $2,500 to $3,000 on food monthly on 16 children who are here from 7:30 in the morning till 5:25 in the afternoon, and they’re receiving breakfast, morning snack, lunch and dinner. They only reimburse me for two meals and a snack.” 

“As a child care owner, I appreciate the reimbursements,” said Rodriguez. “But the bureaucratic part is causing some of us to wonder if it’s really worth it.”

Despite its challenges, CACFP does offset food costs for many providers and demonstrates remarkable adaptability in serving diverse communities. Thex noted that programs can be culturally responsive and customize their menus, for example, serving halal foods for Muslim families, accommodating plant-forward preferences and even sourcing organic ingredients when possible.

Similarly, the program supports children with special dietary needs. Bymun started her child care program because her daughter had severe food allergies. She regularly adapts meals for children with various allergies and dietary restrictions, though this flexibility comes at a significant additional cost.

CACFP helps, but the program only works if it’s accessible for the providers, Bymun noted. 

As the cuts take effect and families lose access to SNAP benefits, Etinoff anticipates that “CACFP is going to be a lifeline for the parents.”

Barren cupboards at home during the summer. Empty stomachs at school in the fall. Advocates predict that may soon be the reality for many of the nation’s children after passage of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which calls for dramatic cuts in federal food aid.

Signed by President Donald Trump after squeaking through the House and Senate, the massive bill will reduce funding to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, known as SNAP, by roughly — approximately 20% — between 2025 and 2034. And new rules are expected to make it harder for needy families to obtain the aid. 

The result: Some will lose at least some benefits, including 800,000 children, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a nonpartisan research and policy institute.

The controversial bill, which delivers tax breaks to the , comes just a few months after the agriculture department slashed from programs that allowed schools and food banks to buy locally produced goods. 

And it arrives at the same time that 13 GOP-led states, including Texas, are , rejecting federal dollars to feed children during the months when they are most vulnerable, citing .

Erin Hysom, senior child nutrition policy analyst at the Food Research & Action Center, said the cuts and eligibility changes to SNAP — the deepest since its as the food stamp program — put students’ well-being and education at risk. 

“Children’s learning will be disrupted and their health will be jeopardized,” she said. “It’s really going to be devastating. Every state will be affected by this.”

Currently, people without dependents are limited to three months of SNAP benefits in a three-year period unless they work at least 80 hours per month and continue to do so until age 54. The new law . 

Under current rules, SNAP recipients responsible for a child under 18 are exempt from the work rule. The new bill .

Mia Ives-Rublee, senior director for the at The Center for American Progress, a left-of-center think tank, said the work-related rules, which require extensive documentation, will pose an administrative hurdle some families might not overcome. 

“A lot of people who get cut off from these services are people who are working but don’t have the time or energy to fill out all of this paperwork,” she said. 

But perhaps the most significant change to SNAP is a shift in financial responsibility for the program from the federal government to the states. All 23 Democratic governors warned Congress in June that they were unprepared to shoulder this new — some noted they from the program completely — and food banks are  

Child and family health advocates were relieved to see at least one of their fears was not realized: The , which reimburses tens of thousands of schools that provide free breakfast and lunch to all students, was expected to lose billions. Those changes were not included in the bill’s final version.

SNAP eligibility among children is a trigger for schools to provide free meals. As fewer kids qualify for food aid at home, those children will not get the nutrition they need and their classmates will also lose access, advocates say.

“As SNAP enrollment drops, fewer schools will be able to offer all students free meals,” Hysom said. “So, we’ll see a rise in stigma in the cafeteria, a decrease in school meal participation, the return of for many schools and increased hunger in the classroom.”

Rev. Dr. Starsky Wilson, president and CEO of the Children’s Defense Fund, is worried about the kids who will be pushed out of the program despite their ongoing food insecurity, noting that children of color might be .  

Wilson said schools moving toward universal free meals in recent years — delivered without students having to apply —  The changes brought about by the new bill mark a major step backward, he said.  

“We believe we will see a shift back to an individual eligibility model, which costs more and means fewer students will have access to it,” he said. 

Beginning in fiscal year 2028, any state that has a payment error rate — the percentage of people given benefits who did not qualify or who were denied aid despite meeting the requirements — must contribute a 5% match for the cost of SNAP program allotments. 

State contributions rise incrementally as the error rate increases: those reaching 10% or higher will be required to kick in 15%, though questions loom about how this will be implemented. as soon as others. 

The paperwork requirement is not only burdensome for families, but for those who process the documents, child advocates say. The task comes as the federal government also plans to drastically reduce what it spends on SNAP’s administrative costs, from 50% to 25%, leaving states responsible for the rest.

Gina Plata-Nino, the Food Research & Action Center’s deputy director for SNAP, fears states will not be prepared to properly administer the benefit program. 

“This will cost state agencies a lot of time — and time is money,” she said, adding new applicants might have to wait to be processed. “The state agencies are already at capacity.” 

Plata-Nino said the related calculations will be more complex, especially for families with children. 

The bill also eliminates , an evidence-based program that “helps people make their SNAP dollars stretch, teaches them how to cook healthy meals, and lead physically active lifestyles,” according to the USDA. 

Correction: An earlier version of the story incorrectly reported that the bill changed the work exemption for able-bodied adults with children from those with dependents under age 18 to those with kids under 7. The reduction to age 7 was in the House version of the bill, but was changed to age 14 in the Senate version that was ultimately approved.

The reality of such a high poverty rate among the youngest and most vulnerable Americans is the result of policy choices. Research that it’s not because the U.S. has higher rates of single parenthood or because low-income Americans don’t work hard enough for a decent income. Instead, where other countries make robust investments in government programs, particularly those that benefit parents and children, the U.S. . And yet poverty has been found to have on children’s development and well-being. The stories below expose the result of this disinclination to invest in families with babies and young children — as well as what happens when efforts to do things differently are abruptly abandoned.

Various data sources all illuminate the same trend: homelessness among children under age 6 has been climbing in recent years, driven by a mix of systemic factors, with disturbing consequences for the country’s children.

During the pandemic, universal, free school meals were a lifesaver for parents like Lynnea Hawkins, who no longer had to pull together complicated paperwork and send it in with her son, making him a target for torment. But then Congress ended the program, forcing parents to once again face shame and stigma to participate — or forego free meals for their children altogether. 

Even when Congress passes a new program aimed at helping families afford the basics for their children, it doesn’t always reach them. Erika Marquez’s family was eligible for the new Summer EBT benefits rolled out in 2024 to help parents get through the lean summer months, but her husband couldn’t figure out how to sign up, so they missed out. “It’s just hard when you hear your child say, ‘Mom, my stomach is rumbling,’” she said.

Even long-established programs with solid track records aren’t always safe. At the end of 2023, the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children, known as WIC, needed more money to stay available to all low-income pregnant people and new parents, but Republicans threatened to break a 25-year track record of fully funding it. 

The often threadbare American safety net leads to some disturbing outcomes, such as the fact that nearly half of our nation’s families are struggling to afford diapers. Some change their children less often than they should to make the diapers they do have last, while others go without diapers at all. 

Some states have taken bold steps to do more to address child poverty. In 2021, Connecticut became the first state to create “baby bonds,” depositing $3,200 in an account for every baby whose birth is covered by Medicaid so that it can accrue interest and create wealth for them later in life.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture recently that provided roughly $1 billion in funding for the purchase of food by schools and food banks. 

And the , which reimburses tens of thousands of schools that provide free breakfast and lunch to all students, may tighten its requirements, potentially pushing some 12 million kids out of the program.

These moves come at the same time the House Republican budget plan to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP. The program fed more than per month nationwide in 2023. In 2022, 40% were  

This recent shift reflects a stark reversal of earlier, nationwide efforts to keep families fed during the pandemic. Many districts, such as Baltimore, organized days after schools were shuttered in March 2020 with no identification or personal information required. Those initiatives led to the nation’s food insecurity rate dropping to a when it reached 10.2% in 2021, down from a 14.9% high a decade earlier, according to the USDA.

It has since crept back up to 13.5% and now, five years after schools utilized USDA waivers to deliver meals in , they are bracing for what could be massive cuts from the federal government.

Elizabeth A. Marchetta, executive director of food and nutrition services for Baltimore City Public Schools, said 31 campuses — serving 19,000 children — would lose out on free breakfast and lunch if the Community Eligibility Provision changes go through. They are among 393 schools and who would be shut out. 

“It would be devastating,” Marchetta said. “These are critical funds. If we are not being reimbursed for all of the meals we’re serving … the money has to come from somewhere else in the school district, so that is really not great.”

Nearly benefited from the Community Eligibility Provision in the 2023-24 school year. The program reimburses schools that provide universal free meals based on the percentage of their students who automatically qualify for free and reduced-price lunch because their families receive other types of assistance, like SNAP. 

In 2023, after the COVID-era policy ended where any student could receive a free school meal regardless of income, President Biden lowered the percentage of high-need students required for a school to qualify from , greatly expanding participation. 

House GOP Budget Committee Chairman Jodey Arrington now seeks to . The budget proposal would also require all students applying for free and reduced-price meals to submit documentation verifying their family income.

, a barometer of food insecurity among students, is already on the rise. It will almost certainly increase if universal school meals disappear for students whose families make too much to qualify for free and reduced-price lunch but too little to afford to buy meals at school. At the same time, kids who are eligible for free and reduced-price meals could lose that benefit if the required paperwork becomes harder. 

In the fall of 2023, across 808 school districts, the median amount of school meal debt was $5,495. By the fall of 2024, that amount reached $6,900 across 766 districts, a 25% increase, according to the .

It was just $2,000 a decade earlier. A trio of Democratic senators is the , with Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman saying in 2023, “‘School lunch debt’ is a term so absurd that it shouldn’t even exist. That’s why I’m proud to introduce this bill to cancel the nation’s student meal debt and stop humiliating kids and penalizing hunger.”

Research shows students benefit mightily from free meals: those who attend schools that adopted the Community Eligibility Provision saw compared to those who did not. Free in-school meals are also credited for boosting attendance among low-income children, improving classroom behavior and

Joel Berg, the CEO of , said further cuts will greatly harm the poorest students. 

“Over the last few years, things have gone from bad to worse,” he said. “We were all raised seeing Frank Capra movies, where, in the end everything works out. But that’s not how the real world works. In the real world, when the economy gets a cold, poor people get cancer.”

the number of Americans who didn’t have enough to eat over two one-week periods between August-September 2021 and August-September 2024. The states with the highest rates of food insecure children were Texas at 23.8%, Oklahoma at 23.2% and Nebraska at 22.6%. Georgia and Arkansas both came in at 22.4%. 

The USDA slashed the $660 million — it allowed states to purchase local foods, including fresh fruits and vegetables, for distribution to schools and child care institutions — and $500 million from the , which supported food banks nationwide. 

Diane Pratt-Heavner, director of media relations for the School Nutrition Association, said that as families struggle with the high cost of groceries, the government should be doing more — not less — to bolster school meals and other food aid programs. 

“We’re urging Congress not only to protect the federal Community Eligibility Provision, but to expand it,” Pratt-Heavner said. “Ideally, all students should have access to free school breakfast and lunch as part of their education.” 

SNAP benefits stood at $4.80 per person per day through 2020 before jumping to more than after they were adjusted for rising food and other costs. Even then, the higher amount was not enough to in most locations. 

Republicans in Congress seek to cut the program by over the next nine years, possibly by returning to the pre-pandemic allotment of $4.80 and/or expanding work-related requirements, said Salaam Bhatti, SNAP director at t. 

Another possibility, he said, is that SNAP costs could be pushed onto states — including those that can’t afford them. 

“This would be an unfunded mandate,” Bhatti said. “States would have to take away from their discretionary spending to offset the cost and if it is not a mandate, then states in rural America and in the South that don’t have the budgets just won’t do it.” 

Food-related funding decreases come as the child tax credit, created to help parents offset the cost of raising children, is also facing uncertainty, said Megan Curran, the director of policy at the Center on Poverty and Social Policy at Columbia University.

The American Rescue Plan increased the amount of the child tax credit from $2,000 to $3,600 for qualifying children under age 6, and $3,000 for those under age 18. Many taxpayers received monthly advance payments in the second half of 2021, instead of waiting until tax filing season to receive the full benefits. The move The expanded child tax credit was allowed to lapse post-pandemic and now even the $2,000 credit could revert back to just $1,000. 

All food-related and tax benefit cuts — plus the unknowns of Trump-era tariffs — will leave some Americans particularly vulnerable, Curran said. 

“It’s shaping up to be a very precarious time for families,” she said, “especially families with children.”

From 2021 to 2022, the number of Kansas children who didn’t know where their next meal would come from grew by 37,000.

The rise in food insecurity shows up at food banks across the state.

Aundrea Walker, the executive director of Just Food, said 30% of the people it serves are under 18 years old. Walker has worked at the Lawrence-based food bank for 10 years. She’s never seen demand so high.

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“The amount of individuals and households we’re serving is absolutely insane,” she said.

Walker said Just Food spends about $40,000 a month on food. That isn’t enough.

“We’re constantly running out,” she said.

Walker said the pantry had to create new, paid staff positions to collect more food. At other food banks, some families line up two hours before the pantry opens.

The jump in food insecurity is mostly attributed to two things: rising inflation and pandemic-era benefit programs running out. Combined, they leave less money for families and force tough choices between paying bills or eating.

The number of children who didn’t know where their next meal would come from jumped from 13.4% in 2021 to 19.1% in 2022, according to Kansas Action for Children’s 2024 Kids Count Databook.

“(I’m) alarmed by it,” said John Wilson, president and CEO of Kansas Action for Children. “When we see every single Kansas county experience an increase in food security among kids, that’s troubling.”

Certain pandemic-era programs ran out at the end of 2021 or start of 2022. Families getting Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or food stamps, could receive the maximum benefit. That ended. Congress temporarily expanded a child care tax credit giving families hundreds more per year. That didn’t make it past 2021. Cost-free student meals were an option. But that was gone by the summer of 2022.

To help kids in Kansas, “we have to help the people who care for them, too,” Wilson said.

Advocates for a stronger social safety want the Republican-controlled Statehouse to put more tax dollars toward things like food security.

Kansas Republicans not likely to address food insecurity

Republican leaders in the House and Senate didn’t say whether they’d debate bills to address the issue. Historically, the conservative state Legislature hasn’t seriously considered proposals in recent years that would expand SNAP or other social service programs.

Advocates for more public spending on social services say the Legislature has instead put up barriers.

The 2015 Hope Act bans state officials from using federal or state money to advertise SNAP programs on radio, billboards or television. The U.S. Department of Agriculture said only 70% of eligible people actually get SNAP benefits in Kansas. That’s below the national average of 82%.

Kansas is one of the last states in the country not using . It’s a federal program that allows more flexibility in admitting Kansans to food benefit programs. It doesn’t guarantee more people get SNAP, but it can mean owning a car or having more assets doesn’t disqualify someone.

Kansas also permanently bans people with multiple drug felonies from getting food stamps, and just last year, the House Welfare Reform Committee supported a bill that would prevent families from buying candy or soda with EBT cards.

Republicans argue those policies protect against the misuse of tax money.

Rep. Francis Awerkamp, a St. Marys Republican, introduced a bill to prevent the Kansas Department for Children and Families from participating in the summer electronic benefits transfer for children program. That program gives Kansas families who are on free or reduced-price lunches a one-time, $120 payment for meals over the summer.

Awerkamp, chair of the Welfare Reform committee, didn’t respond to requests from The Beacon.

Walker, with Just Food, said the Legislature has done some things to help. It eliminated the sales tax on groceries, which helps when you spend $460,000 a year on food like her group does. She said efforts to cap inflation would also help, but food insecurity is a multifaceted problem that can’t be fixed with just one bill.

Looking to the 2025 session

The pandemic-era benefits programs cost millions, which is one reason Republicans are apprehensive about expansion. Haley Kottler, an advocate for a strong social safety net at Kansas Appleseed, said cheaper alternatives could feed more Kansans.

The Legislature could end the food stamps ban for Kansans with multiple drug felonies. The state could also simplify the food assistance application program so it isn’t as complicated to apply. Kottler also wants to see universal meal programs expanded.

Harvesters helps food banks in 17 counties in northeast Kansas and 10 counties in northwest Missouri. Sarah Biles, a Harvesters spokesperson, said the demand for food assistance hasn’t been this strong since the 2008 recession. Demand at food pantries was dropping year after year until the pandemic hit, and the 2022 numbers ballooned back up to the 2008 level.

Biles said government intervention is important. For every meal provided by a food bank or charitable organization, SNAP can provide nine meals.

“We definitely all need to work together to solve this issue,” she said. “There’s plenty of food in the United States. It’s a matter of getting all that food to where it’s needed most.”

This first appeared on and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

This summer parents were supposed to have a bit more financial breathing room while their children were out of school. The government rolled out , the first new federal food assistance program in decades, for its inaugural year, providing qualifying families $120 per school-aged child to help them afford groceries during the summer while going without school meals to help feed their kids. 

Nearly 21 million children are eligible for the program, but there are early warning signs that many families were unable to take advantage of the benefits. 

A prominent challenge is that the enrollment process was opaque and complicated enough that hundreds of thousands of families may miss out altogether, leaving hundreds of millions of dollars unclaimed and sent back to the government, according to policy consultant David Rubel, who has done extensive research on the Summer EBT program as well as its predecessor, the , which gave parents money to cover meals while children were learning remotely.

Erika Marquez’s family was one of many that were unable to access the funding. Marquez has four children — three of them attend school programs and one, her infant, is at home. Her husband, who she is separated from, told her that he received a letter saying that Summer EBT benefits were coming, but said he got no further instructions about how to actually claim the funds. “He didn’t know who to contact, how to contact them, or anything for that matter,” she said. 

Summers are always harder for her family to make ends meet — when her three school-age kids are home, they miss two daily meals they would have gotten for free at school. Marquez was hopeful that the Summer EBT money coming in would help cover that gap this year, but when her family couldn’t access the funds, they suffered. Marquez works full time and says that to ensure that her children have what they need, she has to follow a strict budget to cover all of their expenses, and this was a particularly difficult summer. Living in Las Vegas, Nevada, which experienced the on record, her electricity bill went through the roof after cranking the air conditioning. Normally it costs her about $100 to $150 for the season; this summer she says it was about $400. 

Without help from the new food assistance program, Marquez says she had to ignore those utility bills and prioritize groceries so that her children had enough to eat. “It’s just hard when you hear your child say, ‘Mom, my stomach is rumbling,’” she shared. “It’s more important to be able to make sure that my children are fed.” She had to skip paying for electricity for two months, landing her on a payment plan, which has added fees on top of the bill itself. Had she received Summer EBT for her three children, that would have come to $360 — almost the same cost as her electricity bill, she noted. 

Many other parents have found themselves in a similar situation to Marquez this season. In California, according to the state’s response to a FOIA request made by Rubel, 281,690 Summer EBT cards were returned due to a wrong address and went unused between June 1 and Aug. 31. In a state where 1 in 5 residents is food insecure, this is troubling, especially given that during the pandemic, California $1 billion earmarked for P-EBT.

Propel, a financial technology company that helps low-income Americans with banking and public benefits, administered a of low-income families in August, which revealed anecdotal evidence that backs Rubel’s finding that some eligible families had trouble getting the money. The survey surfaced scattered reports of barriers to access. “No, haven’t received yet,” one respondent from Missouri wrote, adding, “It would help me not having to skip meals to feed my kids.” Another from Michigan wrote, “No, it would make a big difference. We haven’t received them yet, or the card.” 

Most of the families that received Summer EBT dollars got their cards automatically through a process known as streamlined certification. States enrolled them without them having to take any action if they were on certain public benefit programs, including free and reduced price school lunch, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program and the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program. In some states, if a family already had an EBT card for SNAP benefits, for example, the money was automatically loaded onto it; other states decided to send out separate cards.

But a number of eligible families didn’t automatically receive the benefits. For example, families that don’t participate in other programs, but whose children do qualify for free and reduced price meals at school, are eligible for Summer EBT, but they must enroll, which has proven a challenge. In part, that’s because in 2020, Congress made school meals universally free so families did not need to enroll, but that expired last fall, and some parents are out of practice with signing up. In the 41 states without universal school meals, are failing to sign up for free and reduced price meals, let alone Summer EBT. Meanwhile, have passed universal school meals, requiring no paperwork during the school year, so parents had to know to sign up for Summer EBT separately. 

Kelsey Boone, senior child nutrition policy analyst at the Food Research & Action Center, an anti-hunger nonprofit, said that, anecdotally, her organization has heard that while the streamlined application has had a lot of success getting benefits to families, states are seeing “lower than expected application return rates” for everyone else. Kansas, for example, had received applications for Summer EBT by mid-September even though the Kansas Department for Children and Families estimates there are more than 100,000 families that are eligible for the program but have to enroll.

One problem is that some states haven’t created statewide applications specifically for Summer EBT, making it challenging for parents to figure out where and how to apply, and some have buried the applications deep in their websites. Another is that outreach to let parents know what they have to do “has not been as robust as it could be,” Boone said. She added that states don’t always have up-to-date addresses for households, particularly for low-income families who tend to move a lot, so any mail or even the EBT cards themselves may not reach parents. In at least some states, she noted, school districts weren’t even aware they had to tell parents to sign up. 

The same problems plagued the P-EBT program. When summer P-EBT cards were distributed in 2022 and 2023, about $1 billion in benefits went unclaimed by eligible families, according to , and about 4.5 million cards were either expunged or at risk of being expunged. Instead of conducting extensive outreach to make sure parents knew about the benefits and how to claim them, Rubel was told that many state departments of education put the information on their websites and left it to parents to find it. 

The problem with Summer EBT promises to be even more acute. Families had 274 days to realize they were missing out on P-EBT funds and sign up for the benefits, and if they spent at least a dollar the clock would reset, giving them another 274 days. The Summer EBT program gives families just 122 days from the date the money is loaded onto a card to spend it all before it’s forfeited and sent back to the federal government. “This is a very short window,” Rubel said. Nebraska expungement letters in early September. Rubel estimates most of the money will be gone by the end of November.

The good news is that states have been allowed to push application deadlines back so more families can apply and receive their money before it gets forfeited. In an email response to a question about the timeline, a USDA spokesperson said that the agency provided “additional flexibility” to allow all states that participated in the program this year to extend their application deadlines to ensure “sufficient time for applications to be submitted and processed.” The spokesperson said the agency will work with each state individually to determine the “appropriate” amount of time a state can extend a deadline.

Some states have already taken the agency up on the offer. Kansas and both announced they would push their deadlines to apply back.

But Rubel insists that school districts must do outreach to ensure eligible families get the money they’re owed before it’s too late. “They have the capacity, they have the infrastructure,” he said, adding that districts have up-to-date contact information for families. “They need to be prodded a little bit to help their families.”

It’s all the more urgent because the families that did receive Summer EBT dollars saw a huge benefit. In Propel’s August 2024 survey, fewer families reported that they had to eat less, skip meals or were unable to buy the food they wanted as compared to August 2023. Fewer lacked household essentials, owed money on utility bills, or had their utilities shut off; fewer were evicted or lived in unstable housing. Summer EBT “was life saving,” one respondent said. “I didn’t know where my next meal was coming [from].” Another said, “It helped tremendously with groceries for me and my daughter right when we really needed it.”

“This money really can mean the difference between having food on the table and not having food on the table for a family during the summer,” Boone said.

There is a chance to fix this problem before next summer starts. First, advocates hope more states will decide to join the Summer EBT program, ensuring more families can participate. In 2024, 13 states opted out, but , for example, has already said it will join in 2025. The window to opt in for next summer is currently open and will remain so through next August. For the states that participated this year, there are lessons to be learned about expanding accessibility. “There’s a lot of discussion about that right now,” Boone said. Some of that is about how states can improve their outreach, including putting more resources into it, trying to reach families in a multitude of ways and offering better customer service. 

“So many of our problems are so hard to fix,” Rubel said. “This is a really easy one to fix.”

WASHINGTON — Amid persistent  in the United States, lawmakers and advocates on Wednesday stressed the importance of school meal programs during a U.S. Senate Agriculture subcommittee hearing.

Hunger severely impacts  and can lead to negative outcomes in school, . Last year, 47.4 million people lived in food-insecure households, according to the .

Federally funded efforts, such as the National School Lunch Program and School Breakfast Program, provide free and reduced-cost meals to students across the country.

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Advocates say these programs play a crucial role in helping to reduce child hunger and urged the panel to expand them.

“School lunch should always be free and definitely free of judgment,” said Sen. John Fetterman, who chairs the Subcommittee on Food and Nutrition, Specialty Crops, Organics, and Research.

“Honestly, it shouldn’t be a conversation — it would be like asking the kids to pay for the school bus every morning or to pay for their own textbooks at school,” Fetterman said.

Fetterman and fellow Pennsylvania Democrat Sen. Bob Casey  in June aiming to expand free or reduced-price meals access for kids. Part of the initiatives also call for amending the Community Eligibility Provision, which allows schools and school districts in low-income areas to offer free meal options to all students.

Fetterman also sponsored the Universal School Meals Program Act, an effort introduced by  last May, which would “provide free breakfast, lunch, and dinner to every student — without demanding they prove they are poor enough to deserve help getting three meals a day,” according to Sanders’  of the bill. U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar, a Minnesota Democrat, introduced .

Subcommittee ranking member Mike Braun of Indiana said he introduced the  last July with Ohio Democrat Sen. Sherrod Brown in an effort “to better prioritize and support the use of American food in school meal programs.”

That bipartisan bill would increase requirements for school meals to include U.S. products.

States a model

Crystal FitzSimons, interim president of the Food Research & Action Center, pointed out that eight states  that offer school meals to all students, regardless of one’s household income. Those states are California, Colorado, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico and Vermont.

The national nonprofit aims to reduce poverty-related hunger in the U.S. through research, advocacy and policy solutions.

“While those eight states are showing us what is possible, there are critical steps the subcommittee and Congress should take to enhance the reach and impact of school meals nationwide,” FitzSimons said.

As one piece of the puzzle, FitzSimons said Congress can “ensure that all children nationwide are hunger-free and ready to learn while they are at school by allowing all schools to offer meals to all their students at no charge” and the Universal School Meals Program Act “creates that path.”

Meg Bruening, professor and department head at Pennsylvania State University’s Department of Nutritional Sciences, said “the school meal programs in the U.S. provide a critical safety net for almost 30 million children with meals each year” — comprising 60% of children in the country.

Bruening said these school meal programs align closely with the , “ensuring a variety of healthy foods are offered to children while at school, where children spend most of their waking and eating hours.”

The guidelines, developed by the USDA and the Health and Human Services Department, are .

Summer EBT

Georgia Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock underscored how child hunger increases in the summer months when kids lack access to regular meals at school.

Thirty-seven states, the District of Columbia and multiple territories and tribal nations opted in this year to a new effort, known as Summer EBT, to feed kids during the long summer months.

Also called Sun Bucks, the USDA initiative provides low-income families with school-aged children a grocery-buying benefit of $120 per child for the summer.

But 13 states,, chose not to participate in the program in 2024. The USDA said states have until Jan. 1 to submit a notice of intent if they plan to participate in the program next year. Iowa has to receive federal money for an alternative summer meal program.

Warnock said he hopes  on Summer EBT.

“Unfortunately, my home state — the state of Georgia — has not opted in to Sun Bucks, with some officials saying it does not result in higher nutritional outcomes for students, and that existing programs are ‘effective,’” he said.

“I heard our state leadership say: ‘We don’t need it,’” he added. “I’m still trying to figure out who this ‘we’ is — for whom are you speaking when you say: ‘We don’t need it?’”

A spokesperson for Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp has said the governor has concerns about the program’s dietary standards and cost.

is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Iowa Capital Dispatch maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Kathie Obradovich for questions: info@iowacapitaldispatch.com. Follow Iowa Capital Dispatch on and .

As we know, one of the fundamental needs – proper nutrition – isn’t being met for children, jeopardizing prenatal and early childhood development goals. And because , the consequences stretch into adulthood as hunger and inadequate nutrition do permanent harm to future health and well-being.

“Failure to provide adequate nutrition is economically shortsighted,” says Diane Whitmore Schanzenbach, director of Northwestern University’s Institute for Policy Research. Longitudinal studies reveal that nutrition programs for low-income families yield health benefits as well as higher rates of high school graduation and better pay.

Unfortunately, research doesn’t always determine policy. If it did, the U.S. safety net would be responding more forcefully to the pandemic. The news is alarming. Nearly one-fifth of mothers with young children report their children are not getting enough to eat, according to a . A , “The proportion of American children who sometimes do not have enough to eat is now as much as 14 times higher than it was last year.”

There are two primary federal programs for helping ensure young children have enough to eat. The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, known informally as food stamps) and the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC) reach approximately one in three young children in the United States.

WIC is for children under 5 years old, and pregnant or postpartum women; family income must be at or below 185% of the federal poverty level. The federal government spent $5.6 billion on WIC in 2017. , “WIC benefits are cost-effective, generating major savings in federal, state, local and private health care, as well as special education costs.” Ed Bolen, senior policy analyst at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, adds, “SNAP and WIC are important resources for families with limited means, but people have to be able to access the programs for them to work.”

About a third of the $60.6 billion SNAP budget goes to families with children three and under. Eligibility for this program is determined by a formula that takes into account cash income minus certain deductions such as child care expenses.

In “Supporting Development through Child Nutrition,” a paper in the latest issue of Future of Children, Schanzenbach and co-author Betsy Thorn propose ways of addressing the sharp drop-off in WIC participation as children age, and of increasing SNAP benefit levels for families with young children. These recommendations include broadening eligibility and lowering barriers for enrollment. The paper concludes, “Resources available from conception through age three are an important investment in the future health and well-being of America’s children. We need to protect all children, especially the most vulnerable, from food insecurity, inadequate nutritional intake and negative shocks such as recessions.”

Bolen notes that the federal government has implemented during the pandemic to keep some benefits from expiring, and most states responded quickly when the pandemic hit by simplifying the application process. “There’s still an urgent need to make sure these programs remain accessible,” he says. “Especially since the economic fallout has dragged on. Most low-income communities are not returning to normal any time soon.”

Recent years have seen the nutrition assistance pendulum swinging away from access, with additional restrictions (especially for undocumented parents), along with work requirements (which don’t generally apply to parents of young children.)

FRAC and the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities have issued ; the ideas go beyond nutrition assistance because hungry families are also enduring unemployment and housing instability.

• Providing a temporary 15% increase in SNAP benefits
• Extending the federal supplement to unemployment benefits and instituting policies that expand eligibility and increase the number of weeks that unemployed workers can receive benefits
• Providing assistance to meet the housing needs of people with low incomes, including funding for Housing Choice Vouchers and rental assistance funding to prevent evictions once federal, state and local moratoriums end.

Whether these and other measures materialize in 2021 remains to be seen, but the benefits would be manifold.