GOP Bill Targets Michelle Obama’s School Lunch Rules
Republican Rep. Steve King has introduced legislation to repeal new rules — promoted by first lady Michelle Obama — capping the number of calories in school lunches served to students.
“The misguided nanny state, as advanced by Michelle Obama’s ‘Healthy and Hunger-Free Kids Act,’ was interpreted by [Agriculture Secretary Tom] Vilsack to be a directive that, because some kids are overweight, he would put every child on a diet,” said the Iowa lawmaker.
“Parents know that their kids deserve all the healthy and nutritious food they want.”
The bill was signed by President Barack Obama in 2010 and went into effect in July. It caps the number of lunch calories for students in kindergarten through fifth grade at 650, and at 700 calories for grades six through eight. High school lunches can contain no more than 850 calories.
The law calls for larger portions of fruits and vegetables, more whole grains, less sodium, and the elimination of trans fat in lunches. Schools may serve only nonfat or low-fat milk.
To qualify as a subsidized, reimbursable meal, a lunch must have at least a half-cup of fruit or vegetables, the Arizona Republic reported, noting that schools in Phoenix are now offering steamed broccoli, purple grapes, turkey bacon, baked potatoes, and strawberry-kiwi slushies.
Rep. King and Republican co-sponsors of his bill aren’t the only ones protesting the new rules. On Monday, 70 percent of the students at Mukwonago High School in Wisconsin who normally buy lunch boycotted the school’s cafeteria to protest what they view as an unfair “one size fits all thing,” the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.
Middle school students in the district also boycotted their school lunches, and other schools across the country are reporting students who are unhappy with the new rules.
One of those Mukwonago students, Nick Blohm, is a 6-foot-3, 210-pound linebacker on the school football team. He lifts weights in the morning and practices football for three hours after school, burning up some 3,000 calories before he heads home for dinner.
His school lunches are now limited to 850 calories.
Last year, lunch favorites at the school included chicken nuggets and mini corn dogs. Now the super nacho plate offers just eight tortilla chips.
Forgoing school lunches, Blohm has been packing his own lunch from home, according to the Journal Sentinel. One day this week he had a bag of raw carrots, two ham sandwiches on wheat bread, two granola bars, an apple, and three applesauce cups. Estimated total: 1,347 calories.
“I’ve already told my mom we might be packing my lunch for the rest of the year,” he said.
Pam Harris, the district food service supervisor and a registered dietitian, also isn’t happy with the new guidelines.
“Limiting calories in school lunch is not going to help the overweight kid,” she said. “What happens at home is a major piece of that puzzle.”
Touting the new school lunch policy, Michelle Obama said in January: “When we send our kids to school, we expect that they won’t be eating the kind of fatty, salty, sugary foods that we try to keep them from eating at home.”
But another GOP sponsor of Rep. King’s bill, Rep. Tim Huelskamp of Kansas, said the new guidelines are a “perfect example of what is wrong with government: misguided inputs, tremendous waste, and unaccomplished goals.”
