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HR 5740
Introduced Re-checks Congress.gov for new actions and updates the bill's status, and fills in any sponsors, committees, or related bills that are missing. It does not re-pull sponsors/cosponsors/committees/related — those rarely change — and it skips all work if nothing has changed upstream, so it's cheap to click.

WIC Benefits Protection Act

To amend the Child Nutrition Act of 1966 to require mandatory funding for the special supplemental nutrition program for women, infants, and children, and for other purposes.

Introduced Oct 10, 2025

Latest action (Oct 10, 2025) Referred to the House Committee on Education and Workforce.

Referred to
Education and Workforce Committee
Policy area
Agriculture and Food
Issues
Healthcare

Summary

This bill would amend the Child Nutrition Act of 1966 to change the WIC (Women, Infants, and Children) nutrition program from a discretionary to a mandatory program. The bill would require mandatory federal funding for WIC by appropriating "such sums as are necessary" to carry out the program each fiscal year, beginning in 2026, without requiring annual appropriations votes. The bill also clarifies eligibility language for program participation.

AI-generated plain-language summary of the bill text — neutral, and may be imperfect. See the full text below for the exact wording.

Sponsor (1)
98 cosponsors

Actions (2)
  1. Oct 10, 2025 Referred to the House Committee on Education and Workforce. · house
  2. Oct 10, 2025 Introduced in House

Similar bills (6)

Bills with similar text or summary — includes reintroductions across Congresses. Ranked by semantic similarity of the bill text (computed locally); a neutral discovery aid, not a claim the bills are duplicates.

  • HR 8055 — Extending WIC for New Moms Act · Introduced Mar 24, 2026 · Cong. 119 80%
  • HR 1464 — MODERN WIC Act of 2025 · Introduced Feb 21, 2025 · Cong. 119 78%
  • S 4191 — Extending WIC for New Moms Act · Introduced Mar 25, 2026 · Cong. 119 77%
  • HR 6776 — Farmers to Families Act · Introduced May 20, 2026 · Cong. 119 76%
  • HR 5836 — Keep WIC Working Act · Introduced Oct 28, 2025 · Cong. 119 74%
  • S 3842 — 21st Century WIC Act of 2026 · Introduced Feb 11, 2026 · Cong. 119 73%

Text versions (1)
  • Introduced in House · Oct 10, 2025

Only one text version is on file, so there’s no earlier version to compare against yet.

Full text

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

October 10, 2025

Mr. Scott of Virginia (for himself, Ms. Bonamici, Mr. Walkinshaw, Ms. Hoyle of Oregon, Mr. Davis of Illinois, Ms. Velazquez, Ms. Ansari, Ms. Norton, Mr. Bell, Ms. Kelly of Illinois, Mrs. Hayes, Mrs. McIver, Ms. Lee of Pennsylvania, Ms. Simon, Ms. Ross, Ms. Adams, Ms. Tokuda, Mr. Olszewski, Mr. Johnson of Georgia, Mrs. McClain Delaney, Mr. Magaziner, Mr. Moulton, Ms. Tlaib, Mr. Jackson of Illinois, Mr. Thompson of Mississippi, Ms. Crockett, Ms. Brown, Mrs. Dingell, Mrs. McBath, Mr. Vindman, Mr. Khanna, Mr. Casar, Mr. Ivey, Ms. Omar, Mr. Bishop, Mr. Thanedar, Mr. Cleaver, Ms. Lois Frankel of Florida, Mr. Horsford, Ms. Jacobs, Ms. Salinas, Ms. McClellan, Mr. DeSaulnier, Mr. Carter of Louisiana, Ms. Wasserman Schultz, Ms. Elfreth, Ms. Williams of Georgia, Ms. Wilson of Florida, Mr. Torres of New York, Mr. McGovern, Mr. Gottheimer, Mr. Amo, Ms. Leger Fernandez, Ms. Ocasio-Cortez, Ms. Morrison, Ms. Schakowsky, Ms. Rivas, and Mr. Garamendi) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Education and Workforce

A BILL

To amend the Child Nutrition Act of 1966 to require mandatory funding for the special supplemental nutrition program for women, infants, and children, and for other purposes.

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

This Act may be cited as the “WIC Benefits Protection Act”.

SEC. 2. MANDATORY FUNDING FOR WIC.

(a) Program Required.—Section 17(c) of the Child Nutrition Act of 1966 (42 U.S.C. 1786(c)) is amended—

(1) in paragraph (1), by striking “may carry out” and inserting “shall carry out”;

(2) in paragraph (2)—

(A) by striking the matter preceding subparagraph

(A); and

(B) by redesignating subparagraphs (A) and (B) as paragraphs (2) and (3), respectively;

(3) in paragraph (2), as so redesignated—

(A) by striking “the Secretary” and inserting “The Secretary”; and

(B) by striking “, and” and inserting a period; and

(4) in paragraph (3), as so redesignated, by striking “any State” and inserting “Any State”.

(b) Eligibility.—Section 17(d)(1) of the Child Nutrition Act of 1966 (42 U.S.C. 1786(d)(1)) is amended by striking “Participation in the program under this section shall be limited to” and inserting “Individuals who are eligible to participate in the program under this section shall be”.

(c) Appropriations.—Section 17(g) of the Child Nutrition Act of 1966 (42 U.S.C. 1786(g)) is amended—

(1) in the heading, by striking “Authorization of”; and

(2) by amending subparagraph (A) of paragraph (1) to read as follows:

“(A) Appropriations.—In addition to amounts otherwise available, there are appropriated, out of any money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated, such sums as are necessary to carry out this section for fiscal year 2026 and each succeeding fiscal year.”. <all>

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