Early Childhood Education and Care is under growing pressure from policies and narratives that devalue quality and child development. Our new Threat Watch alert will keep you informed of urgent developments—whether it’s harmful legislation, budget cuts, or shifts in quality standards. You’ll know what’s happening, why it matters, and how to take action—fast. Find all Threat Watch alerts here.
From the American Library Association 2/26/2026 In response to H.R. 7661, introduced on February 24, American Library Association President Sam Helmick…
From NEA News 3/20/2026 On March 20, 2025, President Donald Trump issued an executive order to abolish the U.S. Department…
From Vanguard News Group 3/15/2026 Civil rights groups filed a Freedom of Information Act request on March 11 seeking transparency…
From First Five Years Fund 3/2/2026 The federal child care program has a long history of bipartisan support, with a…
From California Budget and Policy Center, February 2026 Around 7 million Californians consistently struggle to make ends meet due to factors like unaffordable…
From First Focus on Children A truth guide for the State of the Union address In advance of tomorrow’s State…
From The Colorado Sun 2/15/2026 Ten empty cribs fill a canary yellow classroom at Mero Kaya’s Jump Start Early Learning…
From KXLY.com 2/13/2026 Proposed budget cuts to Washington’s child care subsidy programs could create sweeping economic consequences. On Thursday, advocacy…
From EdTrust 2/10/2026 Soon after President Donald Trump took office in January 2025, his administration launched an aggressive effort to…
From The Hill 2/8/2026 The courts have proven to be a big roadblock in the Trump administration’s education plans. President…
From New England News Collab 2/5/2026 The Trump administration said this week it is abandoning plans to withhold federal money…
From KTVB7 1/30/2026 As class started for more than a dozen toddlers at Onelau’ena Emergency Shelter in Kapolei, there were…
From ABC12News 1/27/2026 For years, parents of young children have been able to turn to regional programs called Great Start…
From First Five Years Fund 1/14/2026 More than a million families rely on the federal child care program to afford…
From The Imprint 1/16/2026 In a rare and urgent appeal, a group of former Georgia child welfare leaders have called…
From the Associated Press 1/9/2026 A federal judge ruled Friday that President Donald Trump’s administration cannot block federal money for…
From PBS News 1/8/2026 Without federal subsidies, Breyanna Rodriguez’s child care bill for her four children would run $4,400 a…
From Democracy Now January 2, 2026 The Trump administration has frozen federal child care funding to all 50 states, plus…
From First Five Years Fund 12/16/2025 Even in a year marked by a government shutdown, political turbulence, and general unpredictability…
From New American 12/17/2025 As 2025 comes to a close, it’s time to reflect on the first year of the…
From Straight Arrow News 12/12/2025 Head Start, an early-childhood network that pairs classroom learning with health and family support systems for infants…
From Wane15 12/10/2025 FORT WAYNE, Ind. (WANE) — The Lutheran Social Services of Indiana’s (LSSI) Children’s Village Early Learning Center…
From UnidosUS 12/10/2025 Summary: Earlier this year, the Trump administration announced and attempted to dismantle the U.S. Department of Education. Only Congress has the authority to disband federal agencies,…
From 51st News 11/26/2025 Even before the recently ended federal government shutdown, many D.C. families were already struggling. The financial…
From Valley News 11/23/2025 It has been months since New Hampshire passed its state budget, and the status of $15…
From K-12 Dive 11/20/2025 Dive Brief: More than 850 local, state and national organizations Thursday morning released a joint commitment…
From First Five Years Fund 11/18/2025 The federal government reopened on November 13, ending the longest federal shutdown in United…
From Northwest Asian Weekly 11/13/2025 Even a federal government shutdown could not stop philanthropies from supplementing major projects funded by…
From The 74 Million 11/15/225 “Nearly 9,000 children across 16 states and Puerto Rico remained locked out of Head Start…
From Prism 11/6/2025 When the Department of Justice (DOJ) sued the state of Rhode Island in September over a program…
From Kids Can’t Wait Substack Children didn’t show up at the polls last week, but voters showed up for them…
From ABC6News 11/6/205 CHICAGO (AP) — An employee of a Chicago day care center and preschool was detained by immigration…
From WAMU 11/5/2025 D.C. lawmakers have seemingly managed to avert a budget catastrophe and fund new tax relief for families…
From Industry Dive K-12 Dive 11/6/2025 Dive Brief: All Colorado public school students will continue to have access to free school…
From First Five Years Fund 11/5/2025 UPDATE 11/5/25 – Day 35 of the Federal Shutdown As the shutdown continues, Head…
From The 74 Million 11/3/2025 Corrine Hendrickson isn’t new to advocacy — as a longtime family child care provider in…
From Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder 11/2/2025 The U.S. Department of Education is exploring relocating its special education programs, weeks after the Trump…
From The Miami Times 10/31/2025 The government shutdown has been a source of anxiety for school leaders wondering how long…
From the Hechinger Report 11/1/2025 The first hint of trouble for McKinley Hess came in August. Hess, who runs an…
From Mountain State Spotlight 10/30/2025 West Virginia’s Department of Human Services is changing how it reimburses some child care providers,…
From First Focus on Children 10/30/2025 The United States government failed children once again in Fiscal Year (FY) 2025. For…
From The Washington Post 10/28/2025 CHICAGO — Just before noon on a sunny Friday earlier this month, federal immigration agents…
From Lehigh Valley News.com 10/27/2025 Every working parent who sends their 3- or 4-year-old to a “free” pre-kindgergarten classroom under…
From Indiana Capital Chronicle 10/27/2025 Consolidating sites. Cutting curriculum. Dropping pay. Hoosier child care providers are scrabbling for ways to…
From NC Health News & The 74 Million 10/25/2024 April Perez was 22 years old when she had her first…
From First Five Years Fund 10/24/2025 Federal funding for Head Start programs is dispersed on a staggered grant cycle, meaning…
From Federation of American Scientists (FAS) 10/23/2025 Supporting the world’s youngest children is one of the smartest, most effective investments…
From The Seattle Times 10/24/2025 ISSAQUAH — Immigration officials arrested a mother outside an Issaquah child care center Thursday, after…
From Action News Now 10/20/2025 WASHINGTON (AP) — Head Start programs that serve tens of thousands of the nation’s neediest preschoolers are facing…
From Rocky Mountain PBS 10/21/2025 DENVER — Sahyana Ruelas faced a difficult choice last month: keep her job as a…
From Indiana Capital Chronicle 10/21/2025 Indiana’s child care system serves as critical support for the state’s economy. It is also under enormous strain….
From Center on Budget and Policy Priorities 10/21/2025 Earlier this month, the Trump Administration took aim at a vital program…
From KCTV5 10/17/2025 KANSAS CITY, Mo. (KCTV) – Nearly 2,300 Kansas City children are the latest at risk in the…
From Yahoo News via Detroit Press 10/17/2025 Michigan’s state budget unexpectedly eliminated all $19.4 million in funding for a program…
From K-12 Dive 10/17/2025 New York City sued the U.S. Department of Education on Oct. 15 over the federal agency’s decision in…
From Urban Institute 10/17/2025 On Friday, October 10, the Trump administration fired almost all employees at the US Department of Education’s (ED’s) Office…
From Network for Public Education 10/14/2025 Hundreds of employees in the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services (OSERS) —…
From Yahoo News ABC News 10/11/25 The nation’s special education services have been significantly impacted after Friday’s mass layoffs within…
From Chalkbeat Philadelphia 10/10/2025 For more than three months, Lisa Smith has operated several state-funded pre-K classrooms at Amazing Kidz…
From World Socialist Website 10/7/2025 The ongoing government shutdown, provoked by the Trump administration and enabled by Democrats in Congress,…
From Cascadia Daily News 10/8/25 Early learning opportunities for low-income families at Bellingham and Ferndale school districts may see more…
From The Hill 10/5/2025 Some U.S. schools are facing an immediate funding threat due to the government shutdown, while others are…
From First Five Years Fund 10/1/2025 The federal government shut down last night, with Congress unable to come to agreement…
From First Focus on Children 9/29/2025 Federal programs support millions of children with educational opportunities, health care, nutrition, child care,…
From Virginia Public Radio NPR 9/26/2025 The battle over next year’s federal education budget has begun. Congress and the White…
From The Tufts Daily 9/25/2025 It’s a Friday on the Tufts Reservoir Quad, and among the bustle of students finishing up…
From The American Journal of Managed Care 9/24/2025 After President Donald Trump signed the Big Beautiful Bill into law in…
From The Hechinger Report 9/24/2025 TROY, Ohio — For almost as long as she’s been a mother, Sara Laughlin has…
From the Times Union 9/24/2025 Changing how families become eligible can keep them in the program. And that’s important, because…
From California Teachers Association 9/22/25 CALIFORNIA’S MOST VULNERABLE students and families will suffer from the effects of President Trump’s budget…
From Hawaii New Now 9/18/2025 Partners in Development Foundation (PIDF) serves thousands of keiki and caregivers, but its president and…
From Phillyburbs.com 9/18/2025 Right now, Pennsylvania families and educators are caught in the crossfire of a state budget standoff. The…
19 Sep: State Cuts in Washington Scale Back Once-Ambitious Preschool Options for Low-Income Families
From The Imprint 9/18/2025 In recent weeks, Catherine Dennis welcomed parents and their young children to the Yakima Valley nonprofit…
From Education Week 9/11/2025 A federal judge on Wednesday blocked Trump administration restrictions on services for immigrants in the country…
From Ohio Capital Journal 9/10/2025 For 60 years, Head Start has provided child care for the most vulnerable children in…
From ACLU 9/4/2025 CONCORD, N.H. — The federal court in New Hampshire today temporarily blocked, for most public school districts,…
From The College Fix 9/2/2025 More than a dozen higher education institutions will lose federal grants to provide child care…
From The State House File.com 9/4/2025 Child care providers around Indiana will see reimbursement rate cuts of 10-35% as the…
From Education Week 9/4/2025 Federal spending is in the spotlight this year like never before, as the Trump administration has…
From WAPT 16ABC Students are heading back to the classroom after a busy summer for the U.S. Department of Education….
From The Network for Public Education House leaders just dropped their FY26 education bill, slashing $12.1 billion (15%) in K-12 funding for…
From the Network for Public Education (NPE) The federal tax credit voucher program included in the reconciliation bill is a…
From Truthout When Barbara Duffield, executive director of SchoolHouse Connection, heard that the federal budget passed by Congress could eventually eliminate funding for…
From PBS News WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge on Thursday struck down two Trump administration actions aimed at eliminating diversity,…
From MSN.com ATLANTA, Ga. – As students across Georgia return to classrooms, federal funding cuts are raising concerns about access…
From Coastal Point Delaware Attorney General Kathy Jennings has joined a suit against the Trump Administration to stop what she…
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced Thursday that undocumented immigrant children will no longer be allowed to attend Head Start, the federal program that provides child care, nutrition and health assistance to 800,000 low-income infants, toddlers and preschoolers.
The Pennsylvania House of Representatives on July 7 passed a bill that will continue to fund the state’s Pre-K Counts program even if federal Head Start funding is eliminated.
About two dozen state attorneys general and Democratic governors sued the Trump administration on Monday for withholding more than $6 billion in federal funds for several education programs nationwide.
Just weeks before the school year begins, Secretary of Education Linda McMahon is refusing to release $8.6 billion in federal funds that Congress approved for public schools.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott vetoed a state budget measure that would have enabled Texas to provide lunches during summer breaks to needy kids.
Thousands of rural schools nationwide are confronting a precarious financial future, as ongoing phenomena like declining student enrollment and staffing challenges converge with Trump administration policies that threaten funding and resources.
The U.S. Senate is set to vote on its budget reconciliation legislation in the coming weeks, threatening to decrease Medicaid funding even more than the already alarming proposed cuts by the House-passed budget known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. The budget cuts would result in millions of Americans losing their health care coverage and thousands of preventable deaths annually, according to a new analysis published in Annals of Internal Medicine.
Statement in Solidarity with District 65 and Antiracist Educators Everywhere
We, the undersigned educators, parents, students, organizations, and community members, affirm our unwavering solidarity with Evanston/Skokie School District 65 and the Black Lives Matter at School movement in the face of a politically motivated investigation launched by the Trump administration’s Department of Education.
Secretary of Education Linda McMahon, handpicked by Donald Trump to lead the U.S. Department of Education, has just released the most brutal, calculated, and destructive education budget in the Department’s history.
The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) was crafted to meet the needs of infants, toddlers, children, and youth with disabilities and to support families and educators. Now that continuum is at risk.
From the National Head Start Association PLEASE – Tell Congress to Invest in Head Start! As Congress ramps up its…