On July 3, 2025, Bryan Steil, the House member for Wisconsin's 1st District, voted for the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, whose child tax credit still gives low-earning families a partial credit or none: Columbia University researchers estimate that 39,000 children in his district, 27% of them, will be too low-income for the full credit. In April 2026 he voted for a House resolution praising the law for expanding the credit.
The same law's expanded child care tax credit gives nothing to families making less than $30,000, and in March 2025 Steil voted for a full-year continuing resolution that kept child care block grants at the prior year's level, which the policy group CLASP said would mean about 24,000 fewer children with child care help.
Bryan Steil's Votes on the Child Tax Credit and Child Care Help
- Steil Voted for a Child Tax Credit That Leaves Out More Than 1 in 4 Children Because Their Families Earn Too Little. On July 3, 2025, Bryan Steil voted yes on the final One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which passed 218 to 214, after casting one of the votes that passed the House version 215 to 214 in May. On April 16, 2026, he voted for H.Res. 1156, which praised the law because it would "permanently expand the child tax credit." The law kept the rules that phase the credit in with earnings, so "more than 1 in 4 children (28%) under age 17 will be ineligible for the full Child Tax Credit," Columbia University's Center on Poverty and Social Policy estimates; a two-parent family with two children needs at least $41,500 in income to get the full amount. A new rule also "strips the Child Tax Credit from the approximately 2.6 million or more children" in the United States who have no parent on the tax return with a Social Security number valid for work, the National Immigration Law Center found.
- Steil Voted for a Child Care Tax Credit That Gives Nothing to Families Earning Under $30,000. The same law Steil voted for enlarged the child and dependent care tax credit but kept it nonrefundable, so a family that owes little or no income tax gets little or nothing from it. When the change takes effect in 2026, "families making less than $30,000 won't benefit at all," the National Women's Law Center found, citing Tax Policy Center estimates that just 8.5 percent of families with children will get a bigger credit, with almost 80 percent of the benefit going to families in the middle and top of the income scale.
- Steil Voted for a 2025 Funding Bill That Held Child Care Grants Flat, Leaving About 24,000 Fewer Children With Help. On March 11, 2025, Steil voted yes on H.R. 1968, the full-year continuing appropriations bill for fiscal 2025, which passed the House 217 to 213 and kept the Child Care and Development Block Grant, the main federal child care subsidy for low-income working parents, at its fiscal 2024 level. With prices rising, the Center for Law and Social Policy estimated that "approximately 24,000 fewer children will have access to child care through CCDBG" in fiscal 2025 because of the flat funding.
What the Child Tax Credit Bryan Steil Voted For Means for Wisconsin Children
- 39,000 children in Steil's district are too low-income for the full child tax credit. Columbia's Center on Poverty and Social Policy estimates that under the law Steil voted for, 263,000 Wisconsin children, 23%, will miss out on the full credit because their parents earn too little, including 39,000 children, or 27%, in Wisconsin's 1st District; those are the families with the least money for rent, food and child care.
Frequently Asked Questions About Bryan Steil on Child care and families
What is Bryan Steil's record on child care and families under Trump?
Bryan Steil voted for the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, whose child tax credit leaves 27% of children in his district without the full amount because their families earn too little, and whose child care credit gives nothing to families under $30,000. He also voted for the 2025 full-year funding bill that held federal child care grants flat.
Does the child tax credit Bryan Steil voted for reach low-income children?
Not fully. Under the 2025 law Bryan Steil voted for, a two-parent family with two children must earn at least $41,500 for the full credit, and Columbia researchers estimate that 28% of children nationally fall short. Steil then voted in April 2026 for a resolution praising the law's child tax credit.
Does the child care tax credit Bryan Steil voted for help families who need it most?
The child care credit in the law Bryan Steil voted for helps few low-income families because it stays nonrefundable: families making less than $30,000 get no benefit, and families that do benefit get an average of $890, even though the credit can be worth up to $3,000, according to the National Women's Law Center.
Last updated: 2026-10-26