U.S. Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) joined Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), ranking member of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, in introducing the Head Start for America’s Children Act.

The sweeping legislation would expand Head Start to ensure that more than 11 million young children from working-class families have access to high-quality early education and comprehensive services, while also ensuring Head Start educators earn wages they deserve.

Head Start programs offer critical support to children by integrating early education with health, nutrition and family services, providing targeted support to those facing poverty, housing insecurity and systemic inequities. California’s Head Start program is the largest in the nation. In fiscal year 2023, Head Start and Early Head Start programs served more than 94,000 children across the state.

“Investing in our children is one of the best ways we can uplift working-class families and give everyone a fair shot at the American Dream. Yet Donald Trump and RFK Jr. have decimated Head Start, eliminating essential support staff and withholding $1 billion from the program,” Padilla said. “We should be empowering our next generation – not taking an axe to this vital program to fund tax cuts for billionaires. This sweeping legislation would support over 11 million young children while ensuring teachers can earn a living wage and parents can keep working and contributing to our economy.”

“In the richest country in the history of the world, we have a moral responsibility to provide high-quality early childhood education and child care for our children. Instead, President Trump has illegally withheld funds from Head Start and slashed critical programs for children and families to pay for $1 trillion in tax breaks for the top 1% and over $900 billion in tax breaks for large corporations,” Sanders said. “I have a different idea: Let’s expand and fully fund Head Start to make sure it reaches every eligible young child, extend the length of programs so working families don’t have to find additional child care and raise teacher pay so educators are not forced to leave the field or work a second job just to make ends meet.”

For 60 years, Head Start programs have provided high-quality early education and comprehensive services for more than 40 million children and working-class families. Nearly 800,000 children currently receive early education, health care, dental care and healthy meals through Head Start, while their families access referrals for job training, adult education, nutrition services and housing support.

For information, visit padilla.senate.gov.