Speaking of Kids Podcast

The official account of the Speaking of Kids Podcast hosted by Messellech Looby with @First_Focus @Campaign4Kids.

[Speaking of Kids Podcast @SpeakingOfKids]

Happy Children's Day!

[Bruce Lesley @BruceLesley]

Missouri's Parental Rights Bills: Treating Children as Property

The Show-Me State bills are “copy-and-paste- versions from other states that have created education, health, safety, and well-being threats to children all across this country.

Link in replies. (1)

[Bruce Lesley @BruceLesley]

Recent Actions by the Trump Administration Target Children with Disabilities | @First_Focus on Children https://t.co/WqBAMl6hSF by @chadderr @lilyklam_ed

[First Focus on Children @First_Focus]

Urging you to follow and subscribe to our President @BruceLesley’s Kids Can’t Wait blog on Substack.

He provides the “child and family” perspective on policy issues before Congress and in the news.

https://t.co/wj2VE0OSAw

[First Focus Campaign for Children @Campaign4Kids]

Top 11 ways H.R. 1 harms children:

❌ $900 billion in Medicaid cuts
❌ Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) cuts
❌ Affordable Care Act (ACA) cuts
❌ Over $200 billion in SNAP cuts
❌ A pathetic Child Tax Credit that leave 22 million children behind with reduced credits because their families make “too little”
❌ Among those subjected to “baby and child penalties” in H.R. 1’s Child Tax Credit are babies, children in large families, kids who are victims of natural disasters, kids who had a parent die, children in single-parent households, rural children, kids who are victims of domestic violence, etc.
❌ 2-4 million U,S. citizen children, who are part of our nation’s future, getting their Child Tax Credit eliminated due to living in mixed immigration status households
❌ A tax credit school voucher scam that enriches the wealthy so they can make profits on donations at taxpayer expense while cutting public school funding
❌ Cutting solar and renewable energy while increasing tax cuts for coal
❌ Tax cuts for the purchase of handgun silencers
❌ Increasing the debt by over $3 trillion, which is a burden kids will bear in order to finance tax credit for corporations and the wealthy

Kids will look back at this bill and ask…

[Bruce Lesley @BruceLesley]

Agree 💯% with @RepDelBene.

Who are the 17-20 million children “left behind” in the Child Tax Credit by this bill? They are disproportionately—

🔴 Babies and toddlers
🔴 Rural children
🔴 Children of color
🔴 Children in single-parent households
🔴 Larger families

Children are punished for their circumstances and zip code, such as:

🔴 BIRTH: Babies, whose mother lost income during pregnancy, childbirth, and postpartum, which occurs, on average by 38%. When income drops, children often receive only partial or no Child Tax Credit. This tragically cuts the credit for both the baby and all siblings.
🔴 NATURAL DISASTERS: Children and their families, who lose their home, possessions, jobs, schools, and communities in a natural disaster (e.g., hurricane, flooding, wildfires, tornadoes, earthquakes, drought, etc.).
🔴 DEATH OF A PARENT: again, when income drops, children’s access to the Child Tax Credit is threatened, which compounds both the harm and tragedy of a child who loses a parent.
🔴 LOSS OF A JOB: Economic changes, tariffs, or other circumstances can cause job loss, but it can cascade and lead to the stippling of the Child Tax Credit to kids.
🔴 CAREGIVING: Parents can be put in circumstances of needing or wanting to provide caregiving for a child, parent, or other family member, but that lost income can result in the loss of the Child Tax Credit.

In short, those children who need the Child Tax Credit the most, get the least under this bill. This policy leads to much higher child poverty rates.

In fact, a fully refundable Child Tax Credit, as offered as an amendment by @RepDelBene, would cut child poverty nearly in half.

To compound the harm to kids of the big, awful bill, it also eliminates the Child Tax Credit for 4.5 million U.S. citizen children who live in mixed status households. Thus, the bill punishes American children, who are an important part of our nation’s future, for their parents’ immigration status.

Child poverty is a policy decision, and this bill repeatedly doubles down on increasing child poverty, while simultaneously cutting care and services for many of these same kids, including hundreds of billions in cuts to child health (Medicaid, CHIP, and ACA cuts) child nutrition (cuts SNAP or food stamps).

This big, awful bill chooses to increase child poverty and to punch down on those children, and the authors rejected even the consideration of hundreds of amendments that would have improved this bill for children and families.

We know investing in kids reaps enormous returns on that investment. Our failure to do so is not only immoral, but the harm will be intergenerational for these children and our nation’s future.

[Bruce Lesley @BruceLesley]

‘A dark day’ for American children: Trump issues order to kill the Department of Education https://t.co/mln8PskQku

[First Focus Campaign for Children @Campaign4Kids]

In the proposed House budget, Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) could be cut by as much as $880 billion. That would create both a health and spiritual crisis.

We know that children would be disproportionately targeted for the cuts as they were in 2017. As we asked back in 2017, WHAT ABOUT THE KIDS? 👇

Slashing Medicaid and CHIP would do more than touch a nerve, as it would threaten the health, coverage, benefits, and access to care of millions of children all across this country.

The proposed House budget is the opposite of beautiful. It poses a major threat to children and begs the questions: What will @realDonaldTrump @SecKennedy @RobertKennedyJr do? Will they choose to protect or harm millions of children?

[Bruce Lesley @BruceLesley]

The House of Representatives is considering up to $880 billion in cuts to Medicaid to children, senior citizens, people with disabilities, and low-income adults. This would be devastating to millions of people, including 41% of our nation's babies. (1)

[Bruce Lesley @BruceLesley]

Born Equal: Defending the Constitution’s Fourteenth Amendment for Every Baby https://t.co/LmpsigVPZe

This will get nerfed, but it needs to be said.

[Celinda Lake @celindalake]

New Poll: Majority of Americans Support Keeping Vaccines Widely Available to Protect Children and Communities - https://t.co/AYEkCZ0U4e

[KY Youth Advocates @KYYouth]

NEW #MakingKidsCountPodcast episode🎙️

Terry Brooks shares reflections on the first week of #KYGA25, updates on the #BlueprintKY & more.

Have 10 minutes?! 🎧 Listen at https://t.co/K8j7aGXdXr or on your favorite podcast app!

[Bruce Lesley @BruceLesley]

First, President Trump said we are the only country to n the world that has birthright citizenship. FALSE!

Countries in blue all have birthright citizenship.

Trump’s Exec Order “shall apply only to persons who are born within the United States after 30 days from the date of this order.” In other words, the target of harm: BABIES!

The public overwhelmingly opposes this.

[Bruce Lesley @BruceLesley]

People in Texas largely support their public schools -- in urban, suburban, and rural areas alike.

When you meet other people from your hometown, they ask where you went to high school. They talk about their teachers, know their mascots and school fight song, know the school lore, and recognize their school is a major community asset. People have a pride about their public schools in a way that just isn't the same with private schools.

Go to a sporting event in Texas and EVERYBODY -- the students, the parents, the teachers, the coaches, and community members are all wearing their school colors. Texans love their "Friday Night Lights", but it isn't just football. They are wearing band, cheer, dance, and other t-shirts as well.

One way the Border Patrol in Texas identifies whether people crossing the border are U.S. citizens or not is by asking people about their school colors and mascots. If you are a Texan, the answer is automatic.

Yass and other out-of-state billionaires have no idea. Gov. Abbott and his allies could put it on the ballot but they know they would lose.

[Bruce Lesley @BruceLesley]

Listen to Kirabo Jackson explain how “Money Matters” to children.

https://t.co/ll2v12Iuvd

[First Focus Campaign for Children @Campaign4Kids]

We oppose bills that harm babies and children and will score them negatively in our Legislative Scorecard.

[Speaking of Kids Podcast @SpeakingOfKids]

Want to learn about their amazing project?

Episode #9 - Prescribing Away Poverty with Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha and Dr. Luke Shaefer https://t.co/hHx2z486hQ

[Speaking of Kids Podcast @SpeakingOfKids]

If you rob a bank, there should be consequences for you.

But if you have a baby, that BABY should NOT be harmed or punished, be sent to jail, or be forced to pay restitution.

Immigration should be no different.

Ending birthright citizenship does nothing to the parent, but it denies citizenship to certain babies who did nothing wrong and may even impose a lifetime of statelessness upon them.

[Bruce Lesley @BruceLesley]

“Everything is on the table.” - Rep. Ralph Norman on proposed budget cuts (FYI…Norman has ranked at the bottom of the @Campaign4Kids Legislative Scorecard every single year)

Every child advocate knows that means children will be disproportionately targeted.

Project 2025 told us:
❌ Medicaid
❌ The entire Department of Education (i.e., children)
❌ Head Start
❌ Child nutrition
❌ Child care
❌ Childhood vaccines/public health

The share of federal investments declined in every year of Trump’s first term. They even tried to eliminate funding for Special Olympics. (1)

[Bruce Lesley @BruceLesley]

Agree!

And I am old enough to remember when Trump promised NOT to cut Medicaid.