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Cheddar: Parents in Congress Make Federal Push to Help Moms and Dads

November 11, 2019

"This is an example of a law that would be easy to pass if we got money out of politics," Rep. Seth Moulton told Cheddar as his baby daughter tried to climb out of his arms.

Moulton (D-Mass.) is one of several lawmakers attempting to expand the federal Family and Medical Leave Act to, as he says, "mandate providing paid family leave. And this is important to moms, it's important to dads, but really it's important to kids."

Currently, the U.S. does not guarantee paid family leave. What Americans do have is the federal Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), which provides new parents (and others caring for kin) up to 12 weeks of unpaid time off.

"For a developed country, we don't have paid family leave that is conducive to enabling people to not have to make difficult choices when it comes to caring for their families or keeping their jobs" Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.) told Cheddar.

Murphy leads the Future Forum, which advocates for issues "important to younger Americans," according to her office's press release. The congresswoman introduced the PACE Act (Promoting Affordable Childcare for Everyone) earlier this year, what she called a modernization of the FMLA.

While there is currently no federally mandated paid time off, some states have gotten ahead of the trend. Starting in 2020, Washington will join the short list of states offering paid family leave.

"The way we do it is we provide wage replacement during a long period of leave," Washington Rep. Derek Kilmer, a Democrat, told Cheddar of his state's upcoming plan.

"Opposition to this is some of the big corporations who don't want to pay for it," said Moulton on legislating federal family leave expansion. "We've got to show that there's something more important."