Republican Rep suggests children should get jobs to pay for school lunches

Rep. Rich McCormick (right) tells CNN anchor Pamela Brown (left) that he believes children should work to pay for their school lunches - (CNN)

A Republican Congressman suggested that kids should work to afford school lunches, his answer to President Donald Trump’s freeze on federal grants that may have paused free school meals.

Trump ordered a sweeping freeze on federal assistance, loans and grants on Monday, implicating housing and food assistance, cancer research, and early childhood education programs. The pause was supposed to go into effect at 5 p.m. on Tuesday, but a federal judge temporarily blocked the funding freeze until February 3.

Before the judge blocked the freeze, CNN’s Pamela Brown asked Georgia Rep. Rich McCormick whether he would support cutting funding for free breakfast and lunches. He suggested children should work to earn their meals.

“When you’re talking about school lunches, I worked my way through high school. I don’t know about you but I’ve worked since before I was 13 years old,” he said, adding that he picked berries in the field and worked as a paperboy.

“You’re telling me that kids who stay at home instead of going to work at Burger King or McDonald’s during the summer should stay at home and get their free lunch instead of going to work?” the Georgia Republican said.

Brown pushed back: “I think you’re painting a lot of these kids with a broad brush. I would say that’s not necessarily a fair assessment of all of the kids.”

The National School Lunch Program, which provides free lunches to tens of millions of children across the country, could also be impacted. Very specific criteria must be met for a child to be eligible for the program: children have to be enrolled in certain federal assistance programs, such as Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, be from families with incomes at or below 130 percent of the federal poverty level, or have the status of a homeless, migrant, runaway or foster child, according to a USDA fact sheet.

McCormick clarified he doesn’t believe all kids getting a free lunch are just sitting at home and not working. Supporting Trump’s move, he said the freeze provides some time to see where the money is being spent.

The Congressman said: “Who can actually go and actually produce their own income? Who can actually go out there and do something that makes them have value and work skills for the future?”

“How many people got their start in fast-food restaurants when they were kids, versus just giving a blanket rule that gives all kids lunches in high school who are capable of going out and actually getting a job and doing something that makes them have value, thinking about their future instead of thinking about how they’re going to sponge off the government when they don’t need to,” McCormick said.

America doesn’t give its citizens the ability to “dig themselves out” and instead "penalize them for actually working and actually keep them on welfare,” the Congressman said. He added that he believes the country needs a “top-down review” to help Americans get out of poverty because “we’re losing our way” when the government gives “people incentives to stay home and not work.”

Brown stressed that a lot of children eligible for the free lunch program aren’t of working age. “For Head Start, they’re like 5 and under,” she said.

McCormick replied: “I get that. It doesn’t apply to everybody.”

Head Start, a federally funded program that provides early childhood support and nutrition assistance, could be affected. Although the White House has said that Head Start wouldn’t be impacted, providers on Tuesday said their payment systems weren’t running.