On July 1, 2025, Kansas Senator Roger Marshall cast one of the 50 votes that passed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, whose child tax credit leaves out children whose families earn too little: 154,000 Kansas children, 24 percent, are ineligible for the full credit. The same day he voted against a motion to expand the credit to the level of the 2021 expanded credit.
On July 30, 2026, Marshall voted against taking up a resolution to overturn the Health and Human Services rule that ended the federal cap holding child care co-payments to 7 percent of family income. He voted to confirm Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as health secretary, whose department closed half of its regional Head Start offices, and Alex Adams, whose agency wrote the co-payment rule. Since the 2025 law, about 11,000 Kansas children have lost access to SNAP, the Kansas Reflector reported. In August 2024 Marshall voted against cloture on H.R. 7024, a House-passed bill that would have enlarged the refundable Child Tax Credit for 2023 through 2025.
Roger Marshall's Votes and Confirmations on Child Care, the Child Tax Credit and Head Start
- Marshall Cast One of the 50 Votes for a Child Tax Credit That Leaves Out Low-Income Children. On July 1, 2025, Roger Marshall voted yes on H.R. 1, which passed 50 to 50 with the Vice President's vote, so it would have failed without him. The law raised the maximum credit but kept the rules that give low-earning families less. Under the law, more than 1 in 4 children (28%) under age 17 will be ineligible for the full Child Tax Credit because their families earn too little, the Center on Poverty and Social Policy found. Its new Social Security number rule strips the Child Tax Credit from the approximately 2.6 million citizen children whose parents lack one, according to the National Immigration Law Center. The child care tax credit remains nonrefundable, and Only about 8.5 percent of families with children will receive a larger credit in 2026, the Tax Policy Center found.
- Marshall Voted Against Expanding the Child Tax Credit in July 2025. On July 1, 2025, Marshall voted no on a motion to send the tax-and-spending bill back to committee with instructions to make changes that would increase the amount and availability of the Child Tax Credit to match the expanded 2021 credit, adjusted for inflation. It failed 47 to 53. Under the law as enacted, a two-parent family with two children needs a minimum of $41,500 in income to get the full credit, so children of parents in lower-paid jobs get a partial credit or none.
- Marshall Voted Against Restoring the 7 Percent Cap on Child Care Co-Payments in July 2026. On July 30, 2026, Marshall voted against the motion to proceed to a resolution disapproving the Health and Human Services rule on the Child Care and Development Fund, and the resolution died when the motion failed 47 to 52. He had voted in October 2025 to confirm the Assistant Secretary for Family Support, Alex Adams, whose Administration for Children and Families issued the rule. The rule, final in May 2026, rescinds the requirements to limit family co-payments to 7 percent of family income and to pay child care providers based on enrollment. The program provided subsidies to more than 1.6 million children each month, and it reaches only 13 percent of eligible families, the Center for American Progress found.
- Marshall Voted Against Protecting Food Aid for Families With Children in June 2025. On June 30, 2025, Marshall voted against a motion to keep the tax-and-spending bill from cutting any food assistance benefits for families with children under the age of 12, and against a second motion to protect parents and others from the bill's food aid cuts. The first motion failed 47 to 53, and the second failed 49 to 51. The law extended SNAP work rules to parents of children 14 and older, and the Congressional Budget Office estimated a net reduction in SNAP participation of 300,000 people in those groups.
- Marshall Voted to Confirm Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Whose Department Closed Half of Its Regional Head Start Offices. On February 13, 2025, Roger Marshall voted to confirm Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as secretary of health and human services, and he was confirmed 52 to 48. In April 2025 Kennedy's department closed five of its 10 regional Head Start offices, which oversaw nearly 318,000, or 44 percent of, funded slots, according to the Center for American Progress. About roughly 500 from the Administration for Children and Families lost their jobs, The Imprint reported, and federal child care money for the third quarter was awarded to states on May 22, 2025, weeks late.
- Marshall Voted Against Advancing a Larger Child Tax Credit in August 2024. On August 1, 2024, Marshall voted no on cloture on the motion to proceed to H.R. 7024, the Tax Relief for American Families and Workers Act, which would have raised the refundable part of the Child Tax Credit to $1,800 for tax year 2023, $1,900 for 2024 and $2,000 for 2025. The bill needed 60 votes to advance; cloture was rejected 48-44, so the Senate did not take it up. Had the bill passed, an estimated 16 million children would have benefited, including 400,000 that would have been lifted out of poverty, according to an estimate from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities reported by The 19th in 2024.
What Roger Marshall's Votes Mean for Children and Parents in Kansas
- Child Tax Credit. 154,000 Kansas children, 24 percent of the state's children, are ineligible for the full Child Tax Credit under the 2025 law because their families' earnings are too low, up from 135,000 under the old rules, according to the Center on Poverty and Social Policy's state table.
- Food aid for children. About 11,000 Kansas children have lost access to SNAP since H.R. 1 was signed, the Kansas Reflector reported in July 2026, which also threatens the direct certification that enrolls children in free school meals automatically.
Frequently Asked Questions About Roger Marshall on Child care and families
What is Roger Marshall's record on child care and families under Trump?
Roger Marshall cast one of the 50 votes for the 2025 law whose child tax credit leaves out children in lower-income families, and he voted in July 2025 against expanding the Child Tax Credit and against protecting food aid for families with children. In July 2026 he voted against overturning the rule that ended the federal child care co-payment cap. He voted to confirm Robert F. Kennedy Jr., whose department closed half of the regional Head Start offices, and Alex Adams, whose agency wrote the co-payment rule.
Did Roger Marshall vote to cap child care costs for low-income families?
No. Roger Marshall voted on July 30, 2026 against taking up a resolution to overturn the rule that rescinded the 7 percent cap on child care co-payments, and the resolution died 47 to 52. The program reaches only 13 percent of eligible families, the Center for American Progress found, and states including Kansas no longer have to hold co-payments to the federal cap.
How many Kansas children are left out of the full Child Tax Credit?
Under the 2025 law Roger Marshall voted for, 154,000 Kansas children, 24 percent, do not get the full Child Tax Credit because their families earn too little, according to Columbia University's Center on Poverty and Social Policy. Marshall also voted against the motion to restore the 2021 expanded credit, which failed 47 to 53.
Last updated: 2026-10-25