John,

Do you remember one year ago when the U.S. House released a budget that would have cut $64 billion from public education, preschool funding, and job training for young adults and working families, totally eliminating college Work-Study and slashing aid for low-income K-12 schools by 80%?

Or, when Congress proposed to keep WIC nutrition funding for young families flat, which would have resulted in 2 million people losing this critical support?

You stopped all of that and more when the House and Senate voted this week to pass full-year funding bills that increased funding for the Child Care & Development Block Grant program by 9%; increased Head Start funding by $275 million; increased funding for the 988 Suicide Prevention hotline by $18 million; increased funding for housing vouchers; and more.

And, while Congress did unfortunately maintain some cuts to the IRS, which were previously agreed to in the Fiscal Responsibility Act last year, we were able to beat back additional cuts and maintain the IRS’s ability to implement the new Direct File pilot program, modernize the IRS to better serve everyday taxpayers, and continue to crack down on wealthy and corporate tax cheats.

These victories are thanks to your relentless activism, without which Congress would have left low-income families and vulnerable communities behind.

But there is still much more to do. Instead of funding services needed to create a humane and efficient immigration system, these bills increased the number of detention beds and many policymakers continue to demonize immigrants instead of fixing our broken immigration policies.

These bills also did not fully fund the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, which won’t be able to keep up with the demand for home heating and cooling assistance for low-income families.

While we managed to avoid the worst that right-wing legislators were demanding, there is much more work to do to lift up young people, people with disabilities, immigrants, older adults, LGBTQ folks, people of color, and all vulnerable communities. Donate today to power our critical advocacy, which continues to show that when we make our voices heard, Congress acts.

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Thank you for always being by our side,

Deborah Weinstein
Executive Director, Coalition on Human Needs