Even before her “daddy” was elected, Ivanka Trump decided that her signature issue under the umbrella of his campaign would be child care. At the Republican National Convention, she championed “policies that allow women with children to thrive,” but since then, although she’s held meeting after meeting after meeting on the topic, no concrete policy has emerged.
According to a new report from Politico, Democrats have no faith that the First Daughter will get anything done — which is why on Thursday they’re set to introduce the “Child Care for Working Families Act.” Senator Patty Murray will spearhead the bill, which will be a key plank in Dems’ “Better Deal” platform, and which contains a more comprehensive plan for child care that focuses on — you guessed it — working families.
A summary of the bill obtained by Politico indicates it will do three important things:
The legislation will make federal funding mandatory for lower- and middle-class families to ensure child care doesn’t eat up a disproportionate share of their budget, focus on preparing 3- and 4-year-old children for kindergarten, and make new investments in the child care workforce.
Katie Hamm, who works on child care for the Center for American Progress, said the bill “gets at these core pieces and will help actual working families — not just the highest earners.” She added that “right now we have seen no details or action from the Trump administration” on a similar measure.
Meanwhile, Ivanka recently met with conservatives to try to convince them to include the expansion of the child-care tax credit in their plan for tax reform, and she’s reportedly working with Marco Rubio’s office to hammer out the details of the policy. But it’s slow going, and as Politico points out, there’s a major stumbling block: “expanding any type of tax credit costs money, and the administration is already on a serious hunt for revenue to pay for lowering both the corporate and individual tax rates.” Ivanka’s “irrelevance” strikes again.
