Last month, President Joe Biden signed an executive order containing more than four dozen

directives aimed at increasing access to child care and improving conditions and pay for

child care providers. Under this order, almost every federal agency will collectively take over 50 actions

to provide more peace of mind for families and dignity for care workers and who deserve jobs

with good pay and good benefits. Now, the president's been promising action on the national

crisis in affordable and available

child care since its first year in office.

But building the coalition of supporters necessary to move meaningful legislative action

has proved challenging.

Of course, building power for action is precisely the work of organizers and activists who stand

outside of elected office, but work to open the lanes where policymakers can drive change.

One of the key players on the issue of child care is led by our own Dorian Warren.

Dorian is co-host of the Takeaway series Deep Dive, and he's co-presidents

of the national nonprofit Community Change. Earlier this week, Community Change hosted a National

Day of Action on Child Care. Dorian, thanks for being here. Thanks for having me, Melissa.

Let's start with your National Day of Action.

So tell me what your goal was and what it was y'all were up to.

Sure, but last year we held the first day without child care out of frustration that Congress was basically stringing us a long time and again in failing to include child care and major federal

legislation. And as you know, Melissa, our child care system was in crisis even before the pandemic.

And today it's really a tough decision for providers just to stay open, to stay operating,

the cost of parents continues to rise. And as we know, the child care sector is still short 60,000

positions nationwide. That affects everything from our economy to the ability of parents to

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