No Child Should Be an Afterthought

One of the values we say we cherish in Iowa is respect. Not respect for power, wealth, or only people who think like we do.

Respect for human dignity. For the simple idea that every person has value. That principle becomes especially important when we are talking about children.

Recent reporting by ProPublica found that more than 776,000 children nationwide are no longer receiving food assistance through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), commonly known as food stamps. Independent researchers have reached similar conclusions.

The reasons are complex and heavily debated. Some point to new federal requirements. Others point to administrative barriers and changes in how states are implementing the program.

Reasonable people can disagree about the causes. What should not be debatable is the outcome. Hundreds of thousands of children are no longer receiving assistance that helps their families put food on the table.

Children did not write the legislation or design the regulations. Children do not control household budgets, hire lawyers, lobby Congress, or appear on cable news. Yet children often bear the consequences of decisions made by adults.

A society’s values are revealed not by how it treats the powerful, but by how it treats those with the least power. A hungry child is not a Republican or a Democratic problem, and not a rural problem or an urban problem. A hungry child is a human problem.

Respect and human dignity require us to see that child first. Not as a budget line, not as a statistic, not as a political talking point, but as a human being.

Iowans may disagree about welfare programs, taxation, spending priorities, and the role of government. Those debates are legitimate and necessary.

But before we debate policy, we should agree on something more fundamental. No child should become collateral damage in a political argument. When children lose access to food, the question should never be whether we care. It should be what we are going to do about it.

That is what respect looks like, what human dignity requires, and what Iowa values should mean.