U.S. Sen. John Fetterman said the aim of the bill is to "stop humiliating kids and penalizing hunger."As children across the United States have started a new academic year over the past month, many families have had to contend with federal lawmakers' refusal to guarantee universal free meals and the resulting "lunch shaming"—which three U.S. Senate Democrats hope to partially combat with new legislation to cancel student lunch debt nationwide.
Fetterman—who chairs the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry's Subcommittee on Food and Nutrition, Specialty Crops, Organics, and Research—is leading the fight for the School Lunch Debt Cancellation Act with Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse and Peter Welch ."No child in Rhode Island—or anywhere in America—should be penalized for not being able to afford school lunch. It's that simple," asserted Whitehouse.