Finally, this election season, child hunger is on the table

As presidential and vice presidential candidates campaign this election season, Americans are hearing about an issue that is often ignored in politics but has the power to change the country’s future: child hunger.

The issue isn’t new, but the numbers are moving in the wrong direction: A new government report shows that 19.2% of children lived in food-insecure households in 2023, the second consecutive annual increase after a 15-year low in 2021when only 10.2% of children lived in food insecure households. The spikes came as pandemic-era policies expired, such as the enhanced child tax credit in 2021 and emergency SNAP allocations in 2023.

This is unacceptable, especially when the US has the resources to end child hunger.

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Free school meals have been around for more than 50 years. Both Democrats and Republicans have recognized that well-fed children perform better academically, and that everyone benefits from a stronger economy and greater national security when children are fed.

For the first time in a long time, the role of school meals in eliminating hunger entered the national conversation when Minnesota Governor Tim Walz spoke about the issue as he accepted the Democratic nomination for vice president.

While it may be unusual for hunger to feature prominently in the classroom during a presidential campaign, it is not unusual for an educator — which Walz was for years — to insist that food is the most important school offering. For many children, school meals are the most nutritious meals of the day, contributing to their success in the classroom and beyond.

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Good work is being done across the country to reach more students with school meals. At least eight states, including Minnesota, have made school meals universal, meaning they are available to all students regardless of family income. Others, like Texas, are eliminating categories of need – making meal programs more efficient, reducing the stigma of receiving free or low-cost meals and, as a result, providing nearly 70,000 additional children with breakfast.

For decades, barely half of students who received a free or reduced-price lunch even ate at school. Now, many schools have embraced after-bell breakfast options, such as having kids eat in class during the first lesson or offering grab-and-go options. This overcomes the challenge of getting to the cafeteria before school starts, and the stigma that comes with it.

And in the summer, when schools are closed, new flexibility in rural communities means food providers can reach many more children with meals through pick-up and delivery options.

These innovations and policy successes have helped millions more children be fed every day.

But with food prices unusually high — an issue recognized by presidential candidates of both parties — lawmakers on both sides of the aisle must come together and support an anti-hunger agenda.

Just as school meals are an important part of a vision for a country without child hunger, so too is investing in programs that connect families to the economic resources they need.

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Long a stranger to the spotlight, the child tax credit deserves bipartisan embrace

This year, Congress had an opportunity to expand the child tax credit and give very low-income families a lifeline so they could receive the full refundable credit for each child in the household and ultimately reduce child poverty by nearly half. But while the measure passed with overwhelming bipartisan support in the House of Representatives, it was blocked in the Senate. With major tax policy negotiations looming in 2025, lawmakers should prioritize restoring an expanded child tax credit.

When lawmakers make feeding children a priority, families receive transformative improvements, like the new Summer EBT program launched this year, which provides food assistance to the families of an estimated 22 million children. It’s the first new federal nutrition program in decades, working together with traditional summer meals to ensure children get the food they need during the hungriest time of year.

Yet thirteen states did not participate this first year, leaving money on the table that could have fed an estimated eight to nine million more children and allowed their families to expand their food budgets. Summer EBT is a great opportunity to put an end to hunger after school is out. All fifty states must sign up.

Federal nutrition programs and tax breaks for working families are really investments in opportunity for all. School meals create the opportunity to learn. Summer EBT offers families the opportunity to eat healthy all year round. The Child Tax Credit creates opportunities to achieve economic mobility. And the pursuit of opportunity is truly universal. These programs are not just good policy; they are also good politics. No Kid Hungry conducted statewide polls this year in Florida, Texas, Virginia and New York, and in all four states, respondents were nearly unanimous (93% agree or more) that ending child hunger is a shared, should be a dual purpose. In an election year when districts are likely to be won by slim margins, aspiring leaders would be wise to keep this in mind.