A lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s efforts to “dismantle” Head Start programs in Illinois and across the country has been filed by the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of Head Start groups, arguing the federal actions are unconstitutional and have left Head Start operators in a position where they “do not know whether they will suddenly be forced to close in a day, a week or a month.”
In Illinois, Head Start programs last year received over $400 million in federal funding, supporting 28,000 low-income children and families while employing more than 9,000 Illinois residents. Along with supporting early learning, these programs provide meals, health services, support for children with disabilities and more, according to Lauri Morrison-Frichtl, executive director of the Illinois Head Start Association, a plaintiff in the lawsuit.
“This is not against any party. It’s against those that don’t have the common sense to know that this is a really important engine to drive our economy,” Morrison-Frichtl said. “Without child care, parents won’t have a place to take their child, to go to work, and it’s those kinds of points in the mission that have always, you know, that both sides of the aisle support because they realize the importance of our work.”
In addition to asking the federal court to stop the administration from stripping funding for Head Start and closing program offices, the lawsuit also challenges a mid-March executive order requiring programs to certify that they’ve removed all diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives before they can receive grant funding, calling it unconstitutional and overly vague. It was filed in the Western District of Washington and names defendants including the Department of Health and Human Services and its secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. The Illinois Head Start Association is one of six Head Start organization plaintiffs.
Head Start advocates say the federal actions have delayed access to funds, suspended some Head Start services and could lead to continued program closures. The actions also defy Congressional laws authorizing these Head Start programs, according to an ACLU statement on the lawsuit.
“Over the last three months, Donald Trump has put a bull’s-eye on the backs of 3- and 4-year-olds,” Joel Ryan, executive director of the Washington State Association of Head Start, one of the plaintiffs, said during a news conference on Tuesday. “We felt like there’s no other option for us than to seek litigation and to push back against the Trump administration … we see what the Trump administration is doing is anti-civil rights, it’s un-American and it’s unlawful.”
A Health and Human Services spokesperson said the department does not comment on pending litigation.
Head Start programs have received federal funding and mostly bipartisan support since the preschool effort was started more than 60 years ago as part of President Lyndon B. Johnson’s War on Poverty. According to Ryan, Head Start has helped over 40 million children and families since its founding.
Under the Trump administration, the federal government in early April closed five regional Head Start offices, including the Chicago regional office. The administration also is asking Congress to eliminate funding for Head Start in the 2026 fiscal year, according to a 64-page internal draft budget document obtained by The Associated Press in late April. Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation policy group thought to have influence on the Trump White House, advocated for Head Start’s elimination, a position noted in the lawsuit.
U.S. Sens. Dick Durbin and Tammy Duckworth joined a coalition of lawmakers in sending a letter to Kennedy demanding answers on the closures of the regional Head Start offices.
A Health and Human Services spokesperson told the Tribune in early April that Head Start programs were not in any danger and that the closures of the regional Head Start offices are part of a broader restructuring of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services that the Trump administration says will save taxpayers $1.8 billion a year.
Yet advocates don’t buy that Head Start programs are safe and worry about the consequences if the programs are lost.
Ryan, the Washington Head Start executive, said Head Start programs typically help recipients be more prepared for school, less likely to need expensive special education services, more likely to graduate high school and college, and receive higher paying jobs, he said.
Some Illinois programs struggled to access funding for weeks after the Trump administration’s federal freeze at the end of January, with one program in Aurora shutting down because it could not pay its employees, according to Morrison-Frichtl. Several advocates for independent early childhood sites funded by Head Start said the programs couldn’t survive without the federal funding.
YWCA Metropolitan Chicago’s single biggest source of federal money comes through Head Start, CEO Nicole Robinson said. The organization supports 1,650 home-based and community-based early child care providers across Lake, DuPage and Kane counties.
The possible loss of federal Head Start funding is “not only a threat to this organization (YWCA), it’s a threat to those 1,650 child care providers” that YWCA Metropolitan Chicago offers services to, Robinson said.
“No program should be dismantled in this way,” Robinson said, “but talk about dismantling child care is really walking away from our children, walking away from families and it’s walking away from our economy.”
The Montessori School of Englewood in Chicago, which works with 70 low-income children ages 3 to 5 years old, would have to shut down if it does not receive federal funding by December, said Rita Nolan, the school’s executive director. Many of the children in the program are unhoused and rely on the school for clothing, food, emergency care, dental care, fresh fruit and vegetables, therapy and more, Nolan said.
“Early childhood is the most important developmental period in a child’s life,” Nolan said. “If they have a speech issue or developmental issue, we can get them services. We can already have identified them and gone through the observation and the identification process, so you’re not going to kindergarten and then having to wait. The longer you wait for these services, the harder it gets.”
Until federal funding decisions are made, Nolan said Head Start programs have a choice to make.
“Do we look for alternative funding or do we keep on going blindfolded until we actually could be told yes, we’re going to fund the programs or no, we’re not going to, like, the financial instability of that is just daunting,” she said.
