As the House returned this week, First Focus on Children offered lawmakers innovative suggestions for using the tax code to improve the lives of children.
“We believe Congress should pursue tax policies that meaningfully reduce child poverty, improve family economic stability, and provide direct support to families raising children”, the First Focus on Children policy team wrote in comments for the record of the Ways and Means tax subcommittee hearing on tax cuts.
Suggestions included:
- Adopting policies that provide timely, meaningful, and inclusive support during the moments families need it most, such as the American Family Act, introduced by Reps. Rosa DeLauro and Suzan DelBene. This bill provides a fully-refundable, advanceable, larger Child Tax Credit. Its design allows all families to receive the full value of the credit, and it features a larger amount for the youngest children and a one-time baby bonus at birth.
- Modeling measures on bills such as the bipartisan Supporting Newborn Parents Act of 2026, introduced by Reps. David Valadao, Tom Suozzi, Blake Moore, and Debbie Dingell. This legislation would provide support to families welcoming a new child, helping parents address the immediate costs associated with childbirth, infant care, diapers, housing needs, transportation, medical expenses, and other costs. Critically, and unlike the Child Tax Credit in H.R. 1, it is designed to reach the babies and parents who need it most. Its benefits begin at the first dollar of earnings; it features a faster, per child phase-in; and, at the election of the taxpayer, it allows substitution of prior year’s income in case wages fell in the current year for any reason, including childbirth.
First Focus on Children also joined forces with fellow advocates to urge the Trump Administration to implement simple, straightforward fixes to improve the lives of children who have lost a parent: put their benefits applications online.
In a letter to the Commissioner, First Focus on Children, Child Welfare League of America, Easterseals, and Save the Children, urged the Social Security Administration to modernize and improve access by allowing applicants to file applications and to schedule appointments online.
The request follows a “digital-first” approach to government services and recent recommendations issued by the Social Security Advisory Board.
Social Security is one of the nation’s most effective anti-poverty programs for children, providing critical income support to children and families following the death of a parent. Yet recent analysis suggests that roughly one million children whose parents died are not connected to survivor benefits, often due to gaps in awareness and administrative barriers that make applying unnecessarily difficult. Improving the current application process could help close this gap. Read the letter.
On the flip side, while Congress was out of town and Vice President JD Vance was “home alone” (his words), the Trump Administration released another installment in its fraud narrative, this time threatening health care for the roughly 40 million children who rely on Medicaid.
In letters sent to all 50 states, the Administration threatens the states with loss of all federal Medicaid funding. The letters say that the states’ failure to comply with all federal obligations to receive Medicaid Fraud Control Unit (MFCU) funds could result in “denial of recertification, which could lead to the loss of all Federal grant funds provided to your State’s Medicaid program.” The letters stress: “Noncompliance with your MFCU obligations can take your State’s entire Medicaid program out of compliance. This means your failure to do your job as head of the MFCU has put all of your State’s Medicaid funds in jeopardy.”
These threats come as states struggle to prepare for nearly $1 billion in cuts to their Medicaid programs under H.R. 1 and as coverage for children continues to drop. Roughly 1.5 million children have lost coverage under Medicaid and the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) since the Trump Administration took office in January 2025, according to Georgetown University’s Center for Children and Families.
In addition, reviews by the Administration’s own Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) suggest that claims of fraud are grossly overstated and that the vast majority of Medicaid payments are made properly. Read more.