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Dear Friend,
Three years ago, we worked in Congress to eliminate an 84-year-old archaic, wasteful, and inhumane animal-testing requirement for new drug development. Today, we wiped out an 80-year-old “cow’s milk mandate” in the National School Lunch Program.
After its 80-year run, the cow’s milk mandate in the National School Lunch Program will soon come to an end, and kids will finally have the choice of selecting a nutritious non-dairy beverage they can safely consume. With perhaps 40% of kids in the lunch program showing some degree of lactose intolerance, the longstanding federal policy put millions of kids in a terrible position—drink a beverage that makes them ill or go without any drink and toss the milk into the trash.
As approved by both chambers of Congress, S. 222 amends the Richard B. Russell National School Lunch Act to deliver practical, commonsense reforms, including:
* Allowing schools to offer dairy-free milk options—such as soy, oat, or almond milk—as part of their regular cafeteria offerings.
* Requiring schools to provide a nutritionally sound non-dairy beverage to lactose-intolerant students with a simple note from a parent, guardian, or licensed physician.
* Allowing schools to offer whole and 2% milk, in addition to 1% or fat-free milk.
My thanks go to thousands of our members who wrote to lawmakers to end the milk mandate. And special thanks to our partners at Switch4Good and its founder Dotsie Bausch as our key partners on the legislation.
And deepest appreciation to the lead authors of the FISCAL Act who put this issue in play and delivered meaningful reform. Reps. Troy Carter, D-La., and Nancy Mace, R-S.C., led the FISCAL Act, H.R. 2536, in the House, while Sens. John Fetterman, D-Pa., John Kennedy, R-La., and Cory Booker, D-N.J., launched the Senate companion. The Senate bill leaders, with the very special work of Sen. Booker, succeeded in inserting key FISCAL Act provisions into S. 222.
President Trump is expected to sign the legislation soon.
Dismantling the ‘Milk Mandate’ in the National School Lunch Program
This is the most significant break yet from the longstanding rule that only cow’s milk could be served with federally subsidized meals. This longstanding program was an example of heavy-handed government intervention in dietary choices. Washington gave a monopoly to the dairy industry, even though millions and millions of kids cannot safely drink it because they are lactose intolerant.
This reform finally acknowledges the reality that lactose intolerance is widespread among children in the NSLP. USDA statistics reveal that 29% of milk cartons in schools are discarded unopened—wasting an estimated $300–$500 million of taxpayer dollars annually.
It makes perfect sense that kids who cannot drink milk toss it. And let’s remember that 60-80% of African American children, 80-90% of Native American children, 90-95% of Asian American children, and more than half of Latino children, along with many students of Greek, Italian, Jewish, and Arab descent, are lactose intolerant.
Why This Matters for Kids, Taxpayers, and Animals
The government’s milk mandate produced extraordinary waste—of food, of taxpayer dollars, and of the physical labor demanded from cows bred for unimaginably high yields of milk. Today’s Holsteins produce six to seven times more milk each year than they did when this mandate was created in the 1940s.
That level of output carries steep animal-welfare costs, contributing to lameness, chronic joint problems, “downer” cows, and early slaughter. These animals shouldn’t go through these unending hardships just to see the milk they produce get tossed into a trash bin.
This change also represents progress for fairness in the marketplace. Plant-based milks are one of the fastest-growing categories in the consumer-packaged goods sector, generating billions in economic activity and supporting tens of thousands of jobs. Allowing schools to serve plant-based milk brings federal policy into line with a modern understanding of nutrition and medicine, modern markets, and modern values.
We are fighting for better policies for animals and people every day. This is an exciting victory and we are proud to report it to you, with the leadership of Animal Wellness Action and the Center for a Humane Economy. [[link removed]]

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Working for the benefit of animals and people,

Wayne Pacelle [[link removed]] Wayne Pacelle
President
Center for a Humane Economy
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