Parents in 35 states will be able to breathe a little easier this summer when it comes to feeding their children. The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced on Wednesday that children in those states, along with all U.S. territories and four Native American tribes, will benefit from a federal program that will dole out food assistance to low-income families while school is out.
But 15 Republican governors chose not to sign up for the program, which would provide up to $120 per school-age child for each month of summer, supplementing the free or reduced-price lunches they receive during the school year. The governors’ choice will leave an estimated 8 million children less certain that there will be enough for them to eat each day. There’s something particularly cruel about a decision to willfully deprive millions of parents the comfort of knowing that their child won’t go to bed hungry.
There’s something particularly cruel about a decision to willfully deprive millions of parents the comfort of knowing that their child won’t go to bed hungry.
The Summer Electronic Benefit Transfer for Children, or Summer EBT, is an outgrowth of a food security program launched during the Covid-19 pandemic. The bipartisan budget deal struck in 2022 made the program permanent, providing funding for parents with incomes below the federal poverty line to receive $40 per month for each kid in school. The USDA said on Wednesday that it estimates that the program will “serve close to 21 million children, providing a total of nearly $2.5 billion in grocery benefits” starting in June.
This kind of policy should seem like a slam-dunk for any state politician. Summer EBT is fully federally funded, requires no buy-in from state governments, and augments other assistance like summer meal programs and private food banks. Yet the GOP-led administrations in Alabama, Alaska, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Iowa, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nebraska Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas,…
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