S. 5174 — American Food for American Schools Act of 2026

This section requires school food authorities to purchase domestic commodities or products for the school lunch program (including snacks), school breakfast program, summer food service program, child and adult care food program, and special milk program. It limits waivers for foreign purchases to 5 percent of a school food authority’s total annual commercial food costs per meal component, requires annual notification to parents or guardians of any foreign purchases, and directs the Secretary of Agriculture to maintain a publicly available list of granted waivers on the Department of Agriculture website.

This section requires contracts between school food authorities and suppliers for commodities or food products under the National School Lunch Act or Child Nutrition Act of 1966 to include a provision mandating compliance with Buy American requirements. Noncompliant suppliers must reimburse the Secretary for federal funds spent on foreign products, with those funds available without further appropriation to carry out related activities; school food authorities may use noncompliant goods without a waiver; and annual reports on noncompliance must flow from school food authorities to state educational agencies, states to the Secretary, and the Secretary to public posting on the Department of Agriculture website.

This section makes technical corrections to the Richard B. Russell National School Lunch Act and the Child Nutrition Act of 1966. It standardizes the term “reduced price,” corrects spelling and punctuation errors, inserts missing words in cross-references, and updates internal references after redesignations.