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families
Providers, Parents Strike Nationwide in 'Day Without Childcare' to Demand Universal Program
"It's hard sometimes in our current political climate to imagine, but I think it's more important than ever for us to be imagining, because families cannot continue to be squeezed like this," said one advocate.
May 11, 2026
With the Trump administration announcing changes to federal childcare programs on Monday that advocates said would worsen the affordability crisis, the grassroots organizing group Community Change Action said President Donald Trump's attacks on the industry have made the push for a universal care system more urgent than ever as thousands of providers and parents joined the "Day Without Childcare" nationwide action.
"As families face a worsening affordability crisis and childcare costs are outpacing rent, providers have been shouldering the burden," said Community Change Action. "We can’t wait a second longer to create the universal childcare system we deserve—one that actually works, lifts the burden off of families and providers, and invests in our youngest generation to give them the strongest start possible."
The group said families and daycare providers are participating in at least 75 actions, including one-day center closures, across 28 states in its fifth annual Day Without Childcare (DWOCC)—an event that it said would "launch the nationwide campaign that will win universal childcare."
Events planned for Monday include a rally at the New Jersey Statehouse in Trenton; a gathering of childcare providers and parents during working hours in Yakima, Washington; lobbying visits to state representatives in California; and an early closure of People's Day Care in Gary, Indiana in solidarity with programs that have had to shut down "due to Indiana's choice to not fund early care and learning."
According to Meredith Loomis Quinlan, childcare lead for Community Change Action, more than 3,000 parents and providers around the country had committed to going on strike for the day.
In January, the Trump administration initiated a funding freeze targeting all states in what it said was a response to "fraud that appears to be rampant in Minnesota and across the country." The attack came after a right-wing influencer posted a video of a Somali-owned daycare center in Minnesota and accused its owners of fraud at the behest of Republican lawmakers. A small number of members of the state's Somali community were charged with defrauding the state's social services system.
The White House later said it would slash $10 billion in childcare funding for five Democratic-led states—an attempt that was blocked by a federal court last month.
And as families joined childcare providers and advocates on Monday to demand universal care with fair wages for providers, Trump was announcing changes to the federal Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF) that officials said would put "parents back in charge"—but would actually eliminate a 2024 rule that capped childcare copayments at 7% of household income for low-income families, according to analysts.
Loomis Quinlan told Common Dreams that the changes to CCDF will also end requirements that "direct services be provided through grants or contracts and [will pay] childcare providers in advance for their services," as well as "requiring payment based on enrollment rather than actual attendance."
"Every one of those things is a direct attack on our childcare system," said Loomis Quinlan. "And they're trying to frame it as advancements. But it is absolutely not that. These rules are... not going to make childcare more affordable. They're not going to make sure that childcare providers are paid on time with consistency."
The administration's cuts and regulatory changes have come as families across the US are already facing rising grocery prices linked to the president's tariff policies, gas prices have surpassed $4.50 per gallon due to the US-Israeli war on Iran, and the White House's policies have worsened the already existing housing affordability crisis.
A report by Care.com found in 2024 that the average US family with young children was spending 24% of their income on childcare.
"Having this really big childcare bill for families is just untenable," Loomis Quinlan said. "And on the flip side, we know that the childcare providers are not making much in take-home pay, averaging around $14 an hour. And so they also aren't able to make ends meet."
Community Change Action emphasized that while attacking childcare centers' ability to keep their doors open, the Trump administration is also taking direct aim at many providers, more than 20% of whom are immigrants, through its mass deportation agenda. In Chicago last November, federal agents raided a daycare center and arrested a teacher in what one angry parent called an act of "domestic terrorism."
"We’ve had our funds frozen, violent armed ICE agents show up at our childrens’ safe spaces and our places of work, and our Black and Brown communities scapegoated," said the group, referring to US Immigration and Customs Enforcement. "It’s time to take bold, sustained action that starts with this year’s DWOCC."
Loomis Quinlan said that while the Trump administration is waging war on the childcare sector, progressive leaders like New York City Democratic Mayor Zohran Mamdani are making strides toward securing a universal childcare program for all families in the US. Mamdani joined forces with New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, also a Democrat, to fund a universal childcare program for the city earlier this year.
"We really feel like it's a moment to be clear about what families and providers need, which is a universal childcare program in this country," she told Common Dreams. "We need more investment, not less. Deregulating isn't the answer. The changes to the programs announced today by the Trump administration are not the answer. What we need, what we're organizing for today, is universal childcare."
Under the universal program proposed by the group, childcare providers would be paid "a wage that enables their own families to thrive, receive healthcare, paid leave, retirement, and other benefits, and be compensated on par with educators in their state’s K-12 system." It would also invest public resources to cover the true cost of care and professional development of the workforce, and protect against corporate profiteering.
Progressive US Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) has long advocated for a universal program, which he's said should be funded by taxing the wealth of the top 0.1% richest Americans.
Loomis Quinlan emphasized that once a publicly funded universal childcare system is a reality, "it's going to be so evident that this is something we always should have had in this country."
"Can you imagine what it felt like when we were setting up the K-12 public education system in this country?" she said. "People probably thought that this was just 'pie in the sky.' And here we are, we have a great public education system in this country."
"It's hard sometimes in our current political climate to imagine, but I think it's more important than ever for us to be imagining, because families cannot continue to be squeezed like this," said Loomis Quinlan. "We need to start envisioning what it really looks like for our country to set families and kids up to prosper and thrive."
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Out of Sight, Out of Mind: Unhoused Families Are Being Ignored
Local politicians don’t see advantage in tackling a crisis that is hidden from view. So, it is up to the rest of us to step up.
Aug 15, 2025
Our eviction court clients do not want US President Donald Trump’s attention. Nor the Supreme Court’s, for that matter. But they would appreciate it if the rest of us took notice.
Last month, Trump issued a heinous executive order pushing for the arrest of individuals engaged in “urban camping and loitering.” Trump’s order followed on the equally callous 2024 Supreme Court decision in Grants Pass v. Johnson, which gave the legal green light for imprisoning people just because they are forced to live outdoors.
The Grants Pass decision opened the floodgates for state and local governments to destroy homeless encampments and make arrests for the crime of being unhoused.
Fortunately, many people have responded to these heartless attacks with both compassion and action. They lift up the proven success of Housing First programs that address the core need for a safe place to live, which then allows for other needs to be addressed effectively too. Sometimes, politicians and business leaders help—even when they seem to be motivated mostly by a desire to rid the city sidewalks and neighborhoods of unsightly displays of unhoused suffering.
When Trump and others label homelessness as largely caused by addiction or mental health issues, they have the causation arrow pointed in the wrong direction.
All good. Our sisters and (mostly) brothers in the streets and encampments deserve housing and dignity.
But, beyond the demonizing and harassment directed to visibly unhoused people, there is another deeply damaging outcome from all this political, media, and advocacy attention: Unhoused families are being ignored.
Thanks to the research of Princeton University’s Eviction Lab, we have long known that children are the most common demographic among the 7.6 million people who face eviction each year. That means our clients usually don’t look like the stereotypical single man on a downtown street corner or huddled under an overpass. But they need help just as much.
Consider our clients Kevin and Samantha and their infant daughter (I will not use clients’ real names), who each night squeeze themselves in to sleep in their 2011 Ford Focus. Just finding a place to park is a nightly challenge. Walmart security guards and park police pound on their windows and shine flashlights in their faces, waking the baby and kicking them out of parking lots.
Depending on the season, they have to run the car engine several hours of the night just to keep some heat or cooling going. Sleep is hard to come by in their cramped quarters, especially while keeping an eye out for police and attackers.
Since Kevin and Samantha take turns watching the baby while the other one works a shift at a fast-food restaurant, they often arrive early for their shifts. That way, they can take the baby into the restaurant bathroom and try to bathe as the best they can.
Tonya and her two children spent hundreds of dollars on rental application fees, only to be turned down each time because of a past eviction filing. For awhile, they bedded down on the floor of Tonya’s sister’s apartment. But the sister’s landlord threatened eviction for packing eight people into a two-bedroom unit.
So, when Tonya’s meager home healthcare wages allow it, she pays $75 for a night in a motel. The room is dirty—she won’t let her youngest crawl on the crunchy brown carpeting—and the parking lot is filled with loud, frightening people. But the motel doesn’t check tenant records, and it beats the alternative. On the nights Tonya cannot afford the motel fee, she and the kids sleep in the car.
Shelters Full; So is Subsidized Housing
Each morning, Samantha and Tonya call the handful of local shelters that accept families and ask if there are beds available. The answer is almost always no. After that, there is nowhere else to call. Subsidized housing for families has years-long waiting lists, which means 3 of every 4 households eligible for subsidized housing are out of luck.
These families are sometimes referred to as the hidden homeless. Parents with children avoid the streets and encampments not just for safety reasons: Allowing their kids to be seen unhoused can trigger a call to child welfare agencies. Unhoused families staying out of sight is a big reason why the official homelessness count is widely acknowledged as being far too low, especially when it comes to child homelessness.
Volunteers and professionals conducting the annual Housing and Urban Development “Point in Time” count do their best, but you can’t tally what you can’t see. That means that communities’ homeless counts sometimes fail to include almost any children at all, despite the fact a recent report by SchoolHouse Connection and the University of Michigan revealed that nearly a half-million infants and toddlers were homeless during the studied years of 2022 and 2023. For pre-K to grade 12 students, the number was 1.37 million. For context, that means the total number of kids experiencing homelessness in the US over the course of just two years is significantly larger than the entire population of the city of Philadelphia.
Living wages, childcare guarantees, and affordable housing—especially affordable housing—would shut down our eviction courts and empty out homeless family shelters.
When Trump and others label homelessness as largely caused by addiction or mental health issues, they have the causation arrow pointed in the wrong direction. For our clients and the majority of those who are unhoused, their main problem is not mental health. They simply cannot afford their rent. But their housing struggle definitely leads to health crises: Multiple studies have shown that evictions and homelessness contribute to children’s mental illnesses, respiratory conditions, infections, delayed cognitive development, and difficulties in school and social settings.
Donald Trump is not paying attention to this. Downtown business leaders are unconcerned. Local politicians don’t see advantage in tackling a crisis that is hidden from view.
So, it is up to the rest of us to step up.
The solutions are not hard to find. Families living without shelter is unthinkable in other nations, as it largely was in earlier generations here in the United States. Living wages, childcare guarantees, and affordable housing—especially affordable housing—would shut down our eviction courts and empty out homeless family shelters.
To get there, we first have to pay attention to the families of Kevin, Samantha, Tonya, and the million-plus other kids and parents who don’t know where they are going to sleep tonight.
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Economic Anxiety of Americans Surges Under Trump: Poll
"The president promised to lower costs on day one, and by that standard, he's broken that promise and has made choices that will cost families thousands of dollars a year," said one policy expert recently.
May 12, 2025
The Trump administration has made its desire for Americans to expand their families well known, but a new survey out Monday details how a growing number of people are postponing such major life decisions—including having children, buying a home, or expanding their education—due to the economic anxiety created by President Donald Trump's policies.
The Harris poll was conducted on behalf of The Guardian between April 24-26, in the wake of the news that the White House was considering multiple ways to encourage people to have more children. The proposals being floated by "pronatalist" advisers include a $5,000 "baby bonus" that the administration would offer to people when they have a new baby—which would cover less than half of the average annual cost of childcare in the United States.
The survey suggested that the proposal was not enticing to would-be parents in the U.S., with 65% of people who had previously planned to have a child in 2025 reporting they were now holding off on the decision. Thirty-three percent said they were not comfortable expanding their families in the current economy, and 32% said they were unable to afford having a child.
Trump has imposed and rolled back various tariffs several times since taking office; the White House announced Monday that reciprocal tariffs with China were being paused for 90 days while the two countries try to work out a trade deal. Tariffs on Canadian and Mexican goods are partially in effect, and the administration has also imposed tariffs on aluminum and steel imports, cars, and car parts.
The U.S. economy contracted in the first quarter, with the gross domestic produce declining at an annual rate of 0.3% after having climbed by 2.4% in the final quarter of 2024.
For Americans, the tariffs have meant higher prices for items like toys, children's clothes, household tools, and washing machines.
As Common Dreams reported last week, despite Trump's proposal of a "baby bonus," Groundwork Collaborative executive director Lindsay Owens has termed the tariffs a "baby tax"—directly causing essentials like strollers, high chairs, and cribs to cost more.
"The president promised to lower costs on day one, and by that standard, he's broken that promise and has made choices that will cost families thousands of dollars a year," said Groundwork Collaborative fellow Michael Negron told a U.S. House committee last week.
Nearly 80% of people surveyed said they've experienced higher grocery prices since Trump took office—despite the fact that he explicitly promised his presidency would swiftly bring about a lower cost of living—and 60% said they noticed their monthly bills going up.
The Harris poll found that 66% of people are now putting off making large purchases like cars or home appliances under Trump's economy, and three-quarters of those who had previously been hoping to buy a home are postponing that purchase.
Mortgage rates are currently 6.7%—more than double what they were four years ago.
CNN reported last month that although interest rates on home loans have been falling, "President Donald Trump's scattered approach to tariffs and an escalating trade war with China has injected volatility into the stock market, and resulted in a sell-off in U.S. bonds last week."
Sixty-eight percent of Millennial and Gen Z renters—those in their 20s, 30s, and early 40s—said they had a goal of buying a home, compared to 29% of older renters, suggesting that the major life decisions of younger Americans are being most affected by the Trump administration.
The Harris poll also asked respondents if they believed the economy is worsening, and found a partisan divide: 33% of Republicans said yes compared to 73% of Democratic voters who agreed.
But among Independents—44% of whom supported Trump in the 2024 election, according to a post-election survey—64% agreed with the majority of Democrats about the economy's trajectory.
Nearly a third of respondents said they believe Trump's tariffs will cause the most harm to their household finances, despite the president's claims that the tariffs will "make America wealthy again."
During his testimony last week, Negron said that higher prices on essential goods and services "are the types of things that you would expect to hear when you look at what experts have said, that [tariffs are] going cost anywhere from $4,500 to $5,000 more for the average household once they're fully in effect."
"When you look at the promises to lower prices," he said, "the administration is not living up to them."
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