This Sunday marks 51 years since President Nixon vetoed a real national childcare program, the Comprehensive Child Development Act (the ultimate Grinch act!), which prevented the implementation of a multibillion-dollar national child care system. It also marks the last time there was a major Congressional push for child care!

I don’t know about you, but this makes me want to rage scream into a Christmas stocking. 50+ YEARS OF DELAYS? Our families have been struggling for 51 years with no support because of the actions of one man?

You’re a mean one, Mr. Nixon, and unfortunately Republicans in Congress have followed in his ice-cold Grinchy footsteps by allowing critical child care stabilization funds to expire this past September, knowing full well that 3.2 million children could lose their access to child care, childcare centers will close, and childcare professionals will lose their jobs as a result. These funds were crucial to saving an already broken child care industry from total collapse during pandemic times, and are crucial now as child care remains in crisis. Families and providers have already felt the impact of these cuts: last month 29% of families reported an increase in their child care tuition, 28% of child care providers experienced wage cuts or were unable to sustain salary increases, and 24% of providers reported that they are now serving fewer children. [1]

This is why we are urging Congress to finally move away from the Grinch agenda they’ve stuck to for decades and provide at least $16 billion per year in emergency child care dollars, while ensuring no cuts to child care and early learning programs. This is the only way to address a 50 plus year crisis without creating yet another crisis by not ensuring these supplemental funds pass for our families. This will lay the groundwork for the sustained and transformative funding needed to ensure that high-quality and affordable child care is a reality for all families.

For over 50 years there has basically been no progress when it comes to child care affordability and access, if anything our nation has slid backward on care while our families continue to struggle. How did this happen?

In 1971, leaders like Dorothy Bolden, Shirley Chisholm, Marian Wright Edelman, and Evelyn Moore made serious moves to support families by leading campaigns that brought about the Comprehensive Child Development Act of 1971, promoting child care workers as "middle-class experts" deserving of fair wages for the service they provide working families. Buoyed by support from labor unions, it passed both houses of Congress with bipartisan majorities.[2]

This bill would also put control of publicly-funded child care centers in the hands of local leaders, including in Black and communities of color, instead of state governments which are often white-led. As a means to keep their hold on segregation, conservative activists lobbied heavily against the bill, and based on this the then President Nixon issued his veto 51 years ago today.

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Congress needs to stop upholding the legacy of this decades-old disaster. If anything, perhaps they should be more like the Grinch, where at the very end of his story he chooses to do better, be better, and finally be nice to kids and families!

Thank you for continuing to take action in our movement for quality, affordable and accessible child care!

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