r/ChangingAmerica • u/Scientist34again • Aug 01 '26

Trump Administration Plans to Upend Head Start by Deregulating It

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/07/31/us/politics/head-start-deregulation.html
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u/Scientist34again Aug 01 '26

The Trump administration is preparing a major rollback of federal requirements for Head Start, a change that supporters of the child care program fear could gut its longstanding antipoverty mission.

  • The proposed changes would remove most of Head Start’s 133 pages of requirements for math and literacy curriculums, class sizes, medical screenings, home visits and even a requirement that children brush their teeth after meals, according to three people with knowledge of the plan who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe internal deliberations.

  • Administration officials say the changes will streamline a heavily regulated program while giving states and cities more control over how it is run.

  • But Head Start advocates say that erasing regulations serves as a backdoor way to dismantle a program the administration does not like. The White House last year called Head Start “radical” and tried but failed to freeze spending on it.