Letting kids starve is a pretty morally indefensible position, but some Republican leaders have apparently decided it’s good politics.
Last week, the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced what should have been a non-controversial program authorized by Congress to ensure kids in need have enough to eat over the summer when they don’t have access to free and reduced lunch at school.
Low-income families will receive $40 each month for each eligible school-aged child, up to $120, to buy groceries using electronic benefit transfer (EBT) debit cards.
About 21 million children — roughly 70% of those eligible for government meal programs — from 35 states, including Michigan; four tribes; and all U.S. territories will now benefit from the permanent food assistance.
However, kids unlucky to live in 15 states with GOP governors — Alabama, Alaska, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Iowa, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nebraska, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Vermont and Wyoming — are out of luck.
Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen told the Lincoln Journal Star that the funds aren’t necessary because kids’ needs will be taken care of at church camps, schools and 4-H over the summer.
“In the end, I fundamentally believe that we solve the problem, and I don’t believe in welfare,” he said.
Pillen also signed a law last year banning abortion after 12 weeks, following the trend of many red states after the U.S. Supreme Court in 2022 overturned Roe v. Wade. So much for the theory that conservatives would rush to pass pro-family legislation to show that their pro-life stance truly is about concern for children.
GOP attacks on free school lunches are sadly nothing new, with a Georgia congressman declaring back in 2013, “Why don’t you have the kids pay a dime, pay a nickel to instill in them that there is, in fact, no such thing as a free lunch? Or maybe sweep the floor of the cafeteria?”
That’s right, kids. You’re never too young to sing for your supper.
Meanwhile, nine states have now made the humane decision to pay for free breakfast and lunch for students: California, Colorado, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Mexico and Vermont. (Abortion is legal in all of these states, by the way).
Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer first told the Advance last year that her Fiscal Year 2024 budget plan included $160 million for free school breakfast and lunch for all 1.4 million K-12 students. Her office said the additional 18 million meals served could save families $850 per year.
“We know that kids whose stomachs are growling in school is a complete distraction, and we want to make sure that kids have access to nutritious food, as well, so they can learn when they’re at school and not worry about being hungry,” Whitmer told the Advance in a February 2023 interview.
The program has been such a success that there’s now bipartisan legislation to make it permanent, as other states like Minnesota have done.
The North Star State has seen higher-than-expected demand, resulting in the program costing 20% more.
“This is a good problem to have,” Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz said this month. “It also should be a wakeup call. We’ve got a lot of folks out there that may be food insecure more so than we thought.”
There’s an easy solution for any Republican who fears being parodied as a heartless Dickens-style villain: Don’t act like one.
State Sen. Dana Polehanki (D-Livonia) said her experience as a public school teacher inspired her to be the lead sponsor of Senate Bill 500.
“I have stood in thousands of lunch lines with students and I’ve witnessed firsthand how stigmatizing it can be for those whose lunch tabs haven’t been paid,” she said.
Few things are as humiliating for a kid with school lunch debt who’s handed the tell-tale barebones meal for all their classmates to see. Some schools have been known to stamp their hands or throw away their lunch just for good measure.
There’s absolutely no reason to shame children this way. What kind of lesson are we really teaching them?
The bill is co-sponsored by Sen. John Damoose (R-Harbor Springs), who said it was “worth it” for schools to serve free meals to students whose parents could afford to pay because it would “return money to our hard-working families.”
But not all conservatives agree. A Detroit News columnist rolled her eyes at the bill, naturally working in the “there’s no such thing as a free lunch” cliché and sniffing that it was “a base attempt to buy votes through expanding the welfare state to those who don’t need it and to create the narrative in an election year that Republicans want kids to go hungry.”
You know, there are easier ways to troll readers than arguing free school lunches are the embodiment of government largesse, like insisting Lansing has all the charm of Chernobyl in the 1980s (and sadder parking). You just might even inspire a line of snarky T-shirts.
Anyway, now we’re left wondering if Michiganders will ever overcome the trauma of leaders deciding that giving kids free food in school is as much of a right as heat, electricity and clean water.
Setting aside the inconvenient fact that the legislation has a GOP sponsor, there’s an easy solution for any Republican who fears being parodied as a heartless Dickens-style villain: Don’t act like one.
Maybe Dems will run this year on the promise of free Bosco Sticks and low-fat milk in every school (which does seem like a pretty popular platform, to be honest). But really, who cares?
The most important question is: Does the program help people? Of course. The free meals are a lifeline for hungry kids and it’s one less thing for weary parents to worry about.
It’s just the sort of thing that folks who call themselves pro-family should support.