Take Action Against the Federal Funding Freeze
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Take Action Against the Federal Funding Freeze 〰️
Kids Count on Us Statement Regarding the Federal Administration’s Freeze of Childcare Payments in Minnesota
SAINT PAUL — December 31, 2025
“Kids Count on Us, an initiative of ISAIAH, condemns the federal administration’s decision to freeze childcare payments in Minnesota based on a misleading, viral video that has been used to deliberately seed distrust in the state’s childcare system and stoke fear toward Somali Minnesotans.
“Let’s be clear. No one is more outraged by fraud in childcare than the providers, parents, and workers who rely on childcare assistance to survive. This outrage cuts across race, religion and geography. Fraud harms children. It harms families. It undermines trust. And those closest to the system have the greatest stake in rooting it out. But freezing childcare payments to tens of thousands of families is not accountability. It is collective punishment. It does nothing to identify wrongdoing by individuals, and it does everything to destabilize an entire system that working families depend on.
“This decision turns childcare into a political football. A single misleading video has been elevated into a justification to freeze federal funds, while long-standing dog whistles about Somali communities are used to make people suspicious of an entire group of providers and parents. That is reckless and dangerous. Over 20,000 children in Minnesota rely on the Child Care Assistance Program. When childcare collapses, parents cannot work. Hospitals lose staff. Businesses shut down. Entire sectors grind to a halt. This is how you manufacture chaos, not public trust.
“Kids Count on Us calls on the federal administration to immediately unfreeze childcare payments and allow the actual work of investigation to take place. If individual centers have committed fraud, they are currently being investigated and they should be held accountable. Do not exploit fear, misinformation, or racialized suspicion to advance a political agenda that defunds childcare and makes life more expensive for working families. Our children are not pawns. Childcare is not a game. And communities should not be scapegoated to score political points while all families pay the price.”
Providers, teachers, and parents organizing together for a child care system that works for all of us.
⬆️ Our first ‘Day Without Childcare’ ⬆️
Who We Are
We are a coalition of over 500 community-based childcare centers across the state of Minnesota.
We are childcare providers, childcare teachers, parents, and caregivers, organizing together for a childcare system in which every family, no matter where they live, what they look like, or how much money they make, has access to affordable and culturally relevant high quality childcare, and every childcare worker receives the wages and benefits they deserve.
What We Do
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We've been pushing for a department that will prioritize childcare for several years and it passed in 2023! As of July 1, 2024, it is operational.
It will provide streamlined services for childcare providers and families, and make childcare a priority at the legislative level.
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We worked tirelessly to turn a pandemic era program to stabilize childcare teacher wages into a permanent program with ongoing funding that will give childcare providers $600 million over the next four years that will go directly to teachers to maintain this increased compensation.
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We pushed to get the Child Care Assistance Program (CCAP) reimbursement rates increased to the 75th percentile.
The Child Care Assistance Program waitlist was permanently reprioritized so more children who are eligible can get into childcare.
Eligibility was immediately expanded to include foster care families and kinship care families who meet financial eligibility.
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The amount available for Early Learning Scholarships was doubled to almost $400 million over the next two years.