Some Thoughts on Playing Politics With Kids’ Health
In this fraught moment, it would be good to remember that school food used to be a mostly bipartisan issue
By Bettina Siegel
This post first appeared on The Lunch Tray, and a portion of it was adapted from Siegel’s book, “Kid Food: The Challenge of Feeding Children in a Highly Processed World.”
Last Friday, the Trump administration announced a further weakening of school nutrition standards, and I shared my quick, first-take analysis of its proposed rules here.
But since then, I’ve also been mulling over the particular timing of the rules’ release — Michelle Obama’s 56th birthday — and what it says about where we are as a nation with respect to child nutrition.
I should state upfront that a U.S. Department of Agriculture spokesperson claimed in The New York Times that the agency “had not intended” to make its announcement on Mrs. Obama’s birthday. But it strains credulity to believe the timing wasn’t entirely intentional: Normally, when federal agencies release news on a Friday afternoon, they’re actively trying to bury it, yet the Trump administration has never been low-key about its efforts to gut school nutrition.
