A coalition of parents and Head Start providers on Monday filed a lawsuit challenging President Donald Trump’s efforts to dismantle the Head Start program. Oregon is joining the fight.
“Since taking office, the Trump administration has tried to destabilize, paralyze, and sow chaos in Head Start,” Joel Ryan, executive director of the Washington State Head Start & Early Childhood Education and Assistance Program, said in a press release this week.
The administration has frozen funding, conducted mass layoffs at the regional offices for the U.S. Health and Human Services Department and “slow walked” grants — which advocates say left hundreds of families scrambling to find childcare. Now it’s proposing to eliminate Head Start completely.
The draft proposals by the administration have reportedly said that eliminating the program is consistent with the Trump administration’s “goals of returning control of education to the states and increasing parental control.”
If federal funding is taken away entirely, advocates say it would affect more than 800,000 young children and their families nationwide who benefit from early education, health, nutrition and social services every year.
“If we want to preserve Head Start for the children currently being served and uphold its commitment to ensuring that all children are ready for school, regardless of their background, income, race, ethnicity, or zip code,” Ryan said, “we must stand up to the unlawful actions this administration has taken to kneecap Head Start.”
Head Start was launched in 1965 out of the American Civil Rights Movement and its promise of racial and economic justice, particularly for Black women and children. Since then, advocates report that Head Start has helped more than 40 million children and their families by preparing kids for school and supporting working parents with access to childcare.
The plaintiffs in the new lawsuit are the parent groups Parent Voices Oakland and Family Forward Oregon, as well as the Head Start associations of the states of Washington, Illinois, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. They are represented by the American Civil Liberties Union, the ACLU of Washington, the ACLU of Illinois, and the Impact Fund, a California-based nonprofit.
The lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington against HHS, which is responsible for administering Head Start. The federal agency is responsible for distributing federal funds, issuing program guidance and ensuring grantee compliance with federal law.
The complaint alleges that the federal agency unlawfully implemented executive orders by gutting the program of staff and resources, delaying access to funds and issuing vague policies that ban core Head Start programming.
These actions have already led to the suspension or termination of Head Start services and are likely to cause more closures, as outlined in the complaint. Meanwhile, advocates argue the ban puts agencies in an untenable position and risks compromising the quality of Head Start services that families receive.
Leaders of Head Start programs don’t know if, in order to comply with the latest federal orders, they need to cancel current vendor contracts, stop hiring bilingual or culturally competent staff, and abandon outreach efforts that help enroll underserved families. Agencies that attempt to comply with recent federal mandates risk violating their statutory obligations to meet the diverse needs of the communities they serve and risk losing their federal designation.
The plaintiffs are asking the court to declare the dismantling of Head Start illegal.
Candice Vickers is a mother of two, a former Head Start participant herself, and the executive director of Family Forward Oregon. She described Trump’s actions as short-sighted and unlawful.
“In Oregon, we believe in caring for each other. Head Start is a lifeline that gives children and families, including Black, Indigenous, Pacific Islander, Latinx, and immigrant children and families, a fair opportunity to work towards a better life,” Vickers said.
More than 12,000 kids in Oregon and their families are at risk of losing access to the program under the expected cuts, she said. That includes support for caregivers such as home visits, parent engagement and support, and nutrition and behavioral health services.
Vickers said Family Forward Oregon heard from a single mom of three in Portland who, despite working a full-time job, still couldn’t afford childcare. If she loses Head Start, she will have to leave the workforce and be “forced out of her opportunity to make it out of poverty,” Vickers said.
Vickers gave other examples during a press call Tuesday morning — families in Corvallis that were informed last week that their early Head Start program has been shut down with no reopening date identified; a mom in rural Oregon who shared how important Head Start was was to helping her “get clean,” and at the same time, “sparked the joy of reading in her daughter.”
“Head Start is more than just a preschool program,” she said. “It’s a lifeline for working parents.”
And slashing access to Head Start, Vickers argues, will have huge consequences that extend far beyond the children losing their education today.
“When families are forced out of the workforce and they lose critical supports like Head Start,” she said, “it costs businesses, it costs taxpayers, and it weakens our economy for generations to come.”
This story comes to you from the Northwest News Network, a collaboration between public media organizations in Oregon and Washington.