The Trump administration has frozen federal child care funding for Illinois and other states while it conducts a fraud-related review, setting off alarm among parents who rely on subsidies and among child care centers that administer them.
For Breyanna Rodriguez of Cortland, Illinois, the stakes are immediate. She said that without child care assistance, her bill for her four children would run $4,400 a month, which would consume most of her husband’s paycheck. With the subsidy, Rodriguez said she is able to work part-time and take community college classes while she prepares for nursing school, but she warned that the freeze and review could upend that plan.
Rodriguez said losing her subsidy would force major changes. She said, “I’ll have to drop out of work. I’ll have to drop out of school.” She also said, “I just wish this administration didn’t make such a drastic leap,” adding that she believes families are not being grasped as the review proceeds.
The freeze comes as part of a broader crackdown on the $12 billion Child Care and Development Fund, which subsidizes care for 1.4 million children from low-income households. The administration has required states to provide extra documentation before receiving the money, citing unspecified allegations of fraud, and the administration has not released information about the specific fraud allegations that prompted the scrutiny.
On Tuesday, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said it identified concerns that federal benefits “intended for American citizens and lawful residents may have been improperly provided to individuals who are not eligible under federal law.” HHS said it would freeze child care subsidy funding until states provide more exhaustive documentation, and it also said it would withhold other federal safety net money for certain states, including Temporary Assistance for Needy Families.
The HHS action named California, Colorado, Illinois, Minnesota and New York as states whose safety net money would be withheld. Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, according to the account, supports low-income parents with children under 18 with direct payments and also provides child care. The administration’s approach has raised fears of delays and disruptions for the child care industry, which has been dealing with staff shortages, long waits for subsidy programs and the effects of the Trump administration crackdown on immigration.
Ruth Friedman, who headed the federal Office of Child Care under President Joe Biden, said she was concerned the added requirements would lead to delays in funding, which could immediately endanger child care programs. Friedman said the information the administration asked for might not be readily available.
Providers and parents also said they are already operating under tight rules to access federal dollars. Dawn Uribe, who runs Mis Amigos Preschool with several Minnesota locations, said staff must make sure children sign in and out with the correct ID and that it can take a month to get paid for services, while inspectors regularly visit to assess records. Uribe said, “There’s already so much oversight that goes into this so I don’t really understand how much more they can do,” and she said she is considering forgoing the subsidies.
Karen DeVos, who runs three child care facilities in rural northwest Minnesota, said she is preparing her staff to pull records on the spot in case an investigator shows up unannounced. DeVos said, “If we continue to view every provider as somebody who could be committing fraud, we are going to lose really valuable resources in our child care providers,” and she added that “There is only so much stress that people can take and not knowing every single day if somebody is going to knock on your door and accuse you of something is terrifying.”
Beyond official investigations, some providers said they are wary of amateur sleuths showing up at their doors. The account cited Nick Shirley, described as a right-wing influencer, who claimed he’d found rampant fraud at day care centers operated by Somali residents in Minneapolis, and it said the Trump administration cited Shirley’s viral video when it decided to cut off certain federal funding streams.
Parents said the subsidy payments are also tied to employment and scheduling stability. Charity Pallum said she and her husband would not be able to afford child care for their 1-year-old twins without federal subsidies, but that with the help they both can work full-time. Pallum, a teacher living in Ada, Minnesota, said neither she nor her husband wants to risk missing paychecks if they lose the child care subsidy.
Pallum said, “We have responsibilities to our families and we have responsibilities to our work, and we want to maintain both.” With federal child care funds, she said, “we can give our twins a consistent schedule,” adding that she believes consistency helps both the children and the parents.
It is unclear, the account said, if or when child care providers and families like Rodriguez’s would feel the pinch as the review proceeds and states work to meet new documentation requirements.
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