“The crisis of care is now so acute that it can no longer be treated as a private issue. A number of Democrats have seized on this moment to push for universal child care. New York City’s mayor, Zohran Mamdani, has aggressively added free child care across the city, while insisting that it is a public responsibility, not a private one — a right, not a privilege. In San Francisco, Mayor Daniel Lurie has begun an ambitious plan to subsidize child care. A family of four earning less than $230,000 a year, for instance, can now claim free child care. Those making less than $310,000 will soon receive a 50 percent subsidy.

“Many Democrats have long wanted these kinds of programs. But now even a majority of Republican voters support policies like paid leave, affordable child care and tax credits for parents. In Utah, the Republican governor Spencer Cox is trying to end the stigma against people who temporarily leave the work force to care for a child or a parent by hiring them into state government.”

— “The American Family Is at a Breaking Point. Our Politics Have Finally Noticed.” by By Jia Lynn Yang, The New York Times, June 8, 2026