Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act of 2023

Floor Speech

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Mr. GROTHMAN. Mr. Chair, I thank Ms. Foxx for making Biblical allusions. Last week, we were here talking about National Bible Week. One of the phrases that you run across again and again as you read the Bible is that God promised Abraham a land flowing of milk and honey. I will let the body decide what type of milk the Lord was promising Abraham. I think I know.

As somebody who has been drinking milk my whole life, I can tell you a better tasting milk, and a milk that I think is more likely to be consumed, is whole milk. For some reason, the current administration is waging war on milk. The USDA's current restrictions on school lunches are limiting nutritious options for kids. This comes at a time when it is found that 90 percent of Americans do not eat enough dairy to meet the dietary recommendations.

Drinking milk leads to better bone health and lower risk for type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease. Additionally, milk stands as a leading and accessible source of nine essential nutrients that children often fall short of.

Proposed guidelines such as limiting milk options by age group and counting milk fat against weekly saturated allowance threaten to deprive students of essential nutrients.

It is crucial that students have access to the nutritional benefits of milk. With these restrictions, they might choose to forgo milk entirely, if you have to drink the less tasty 1 percent, or even worse, fat-free milk.

These proposed restrictions ignore several recent research studies examining the effect of higher fat milk consumption which found that it is associated with lower childhood obesity and concluded that dietary guidelines that recommend reduced-fat milk versions might not provide a benefit in lowering the risk of childhood obesity, which we are all for.

I implore each of you to consider the Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act of 2023 as a commonsense solution to ensure that we have healthy children.

Mr. Chair, I ask my fellow Members to vote ``yes'' on H.R. 1147.

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