How Do You Feel About Starving?

As a nation, the US has argued for years over funding for things like school lunches. The situation has gotten so bad that some schools have GoFundMe programs, others have generous MegaDonors, and still others have annual fundraisers to make sure that every child has food to eat. That the basic concept of providing food to children has any debate at all demonstrates the inhumanity of those in government. This isn’t new. This isn’t a left or right thing. This is a YOU thing. Every school in every state could provide free lunches for all their students if they wanted.

Until now.

This week, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) decided to eliminate $1.1 billion in funding for public food programs. The bulk of that affects the school lunch program nationwide. “Millions of children could lose free school meals,” the School Nutrition Association (SNA) said in a statement, as a result of the $1 billion in cuts to the Department of Agriculture (USDA). That means about $660 million of those funds will no longer go to feeding needy children in schools and childcare facilities, set up through the Local Food for Schools Cooperative Agreement Program. Those funds were meant to purchase healthy, local, and regional foods for school meals, supplied by local farmers and ranchers. 

“These proposals [come] . . . at a time when working families are struggling with rising food costs,” said Shannon Gleave, president of the SNA. “Meanwhile, short-staffed school nutrition teams, striving to improve menus and expand scratch-cooking, would be saddled with time-consuming and costly paperwork created by new government inefficiencies.”

The cuts also come at a time when many state legislatures are already well past the point of considering any new legislation that might help make up for the loss. Budgets for the next school year, already items of controversy in many places, have been set and they were already insufficient to meet the needs in most states.

But wait, it gets worse.

The Local Food Purchase Assistance Cooperative Agreement Program, which supports food banks and other feeding organizations, has also been cut. USDA notified states that it was unfreezing funds for existing LFPA agreements but did not plan to carry out a second round of funding for fiscal year 2025.

In a statement, a USDA spokesperson confirmed that funding, previously announced last October, “is no longer available and those agreements will be terminated following 60-day notification.” The Local Food Purchase Assistance Cooperative Agreement Program, which supports food banks and other feeding organizations, has also been cut. USDA notified states that it was unfreezing funds for existing LFPA agreements but did not plan to carry out a second round of funding for fiscal year 2025.

The spokesperson added: “These programs, created under the former Administration via Executive authority, no longer effectuate the goals of the agency. LFPA and LFPA Plus agreements that were in place prior to LFPA 25, which still have substantial financial resources remaining, will continue to be in effect for the remainder of the period of performance.”

“Cutting funds for these programs is a slap in the face to Illinois farmers and the communities they feed,” Gov. JB Pritzker said. 

“The Trump Administration’s refusal to release grant funds doesn’t just hurt farmers in the program, it devastates our most vulnerable, food-insecure communities relying on meat, fresh produce, and other nutritious donations.”

Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-Ga.) spoke out against the new measure citing the $7.1 million partnership between the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) andthe State of Georgia launched in 2023 to purchase locally grown fruits and vegetables for schools across the state.

“This will hurt Georgia kids and Georgia farmers. We should support our schools by providing kids with fresh, nutritious food grown locally by Georgia farmers. It’s a win-win for childhood nutrition and Georgia agriculture,” Ossoff said in a Tuesday statement.

At the same time, resolutions currently under consideration by Congress would require income verification to accompany every free and reduced-price school meal application, ending broad-based categorical eligibility that allows families enrolled in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program to be automatically approved for free school meals without completing another application.

It also raises the threshold for the Community Eligibility Provision, which allows schools to provide free meals to all students, demanding that 60 percent of the school’s students qualify for the provision on their own for the school to make the cut, up from the current 25 percent.

The end result is pretty straightforward: starving people in every city in the country. There is no place on the map that is void of poor people. With food prices continuing to skyrocket, especially in the wake of the current trade war, more people are having to make difficult decisions that will inevitably lead to empty stomachs in many households.

We’ve known for decades that increased poverty also results in increased crime. This is not a new revelation and many cities have gone to extreme lengths to try and make sure there were food banks available where they were needed. Now, all of those programs are in danger and the likelihood of increased crime sits on the horizon.

Is this what you want your country to be? Could you be one of those going to bed hungry every night? Could your children or grandchildren be the ones whose grades suffer because of malnutrition?

This is a you problem. Grab the nearest politician by the collar, literally or figuratively, and make sure they know we need that money back. And more.