Trump Executive Order Lays Groundwork for Real Welfare Reform
“lays out principles to encourage economic mobility through work”
While the liberal media continues to obsess on Stormy Daniels and the Mueller investigation, Trump is continuing to work towards keeping promises he made during the general election campaign.
Kristina Rasmussen writes at the New York Post:
Trump just took a giant step toward actual welfare reform
President Trump’s new executive order on welfare reform has laid the groundwork to get more Americans back to work while protecting and strengthening the safety net for the truly needy. Federal agencies must take advantage of this opportunity to roll back harmful Obama-era policies that have trapped families in dependency and cost taxpayers billions.
Right now, America combines near-record-low unemployment with near-record-high welfare dependency — the result of state-level eligibility exemptions, federal loopholes and policies that put work on the back burner. Many of these policies created incentives for able-bodied adults to sit on the sidelines — even though there is good, well-paying work to be done. The resulting safety net isn’t a safety net at all — it has entrapped able-bodied adults in dependency and threatened resources for the truly needy…
The executive order, signed Tuesday afternoon, lays out principles to encourage economic mobility through work — a tactic that we’ve seen succeed in states across the nation. It calls for a strengthened work requirement for able-bodied adults, building off the requirement established in the 1996 bipartisan welfare reform that requires able-bodied adults on food stamps to work, train or volunteer for at least 20 hours per week.
Trump clearly liked this story:
“Trump just took a giant step towards actual welfare reform” https://t.co/LQlACDDLug
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 11, 2018
This is truly a repudiation of the Obama era. You may recall that one of the first acts of the Obama administration was the expansion of the SNAP program. They actively sought to increase the number of people enrolled in the program.
Melanie Arter of CNS News has more on the order:
The executive order provides nine “Principles of Economic Mobility” for agencies to follow when reforming public assistance programs:
– improve employment outcomes and economic independence;
– promote marriage and family as a way of escaping poverty;
– address the challenges of hard-to-employ populations;
– provide more flexibility to States, while ensuring accountability for achieving outcomes;
– streamline services to more effectively use taxpayer resources;
– reserve benefits for those truly in need;
– consolidate duplicative programs;
– facilitate greater sharing of information between States and localities; and
– empower the private sector to find solutions to poverty.
Trump’s executive order calls on federal agencies that administer public assistance programs to “review all regulations and guidance documents relating to work; ensure such regulations and documents are consistent with the principles for reform; send a report to the President on what they can do to get Americans back to work; and take steps to implement such recommendations.”
Trump is having a positive effect on the economy. It’s something that is outside the control of the Democrats or their allies in media. That may be why they have so little interest in discussing it.
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Comments
Yes, POTUS is doing a great job, the job that Congress won’t do.
There should be actual laws passed not EO’s that can easily be undone in the future.
Ground work. Maybe, maybe not.
Entitlement reform has long been outgoing Speaker Paul Ryan’s unicorn, but it got lost in the Orc forest of Mitch McConnell.
EOs last only as long as the man in the office. Thirteen lefty activist groups to judge shop and file lawsuits in 4, 3, 2,….
Future Presidents can leave a previous EO in place so EO’s can survive after a POTUS leaves office.
But they also can be undone with the stroke of a pen at any time.
Laws are harder to change as there is a process that must be followed.
Well, it’s supposed to be that way. But judges so far seem to think they have executive authority when Trump attempts to undo any EO Obama unconstitutionally initiated while he was POTUS if it has anything to do with immigration.
What happened to the welfare reform when Clinton was in office?
I am glad that Trump is trying to tackle this nightmare, but I don’t think it will ever end.
Re: Shane:
Many statutes provide for waivers if approved by agencies. So the Clinton welfare reform changes I believe were waived by the Kenyan Administration, which is why the work requirements were eliminated.
Kudos for citing CSN. I haven’t really considered it before but why not set a MSM citation as a last resort. Many times it will be necessary, but why fluff their clicks and general references
Rehabilitation. Revitalization. Reconciliation. Pro-Choice has been a first-order cause of multidecadal progression.
It would be great if the removal of Federal constraints to these, and other, programs is the first step toward getting the Federal government out of them entirely. To the extent that these programs are a responsibility of government, that responsibility should be at the State level, not the Federal level.
DemocratsDemonRATS have been operating from the Alinskyite Cloward-Piven playbook since the sixties. Obama was broadening the scope of these efforts to “fundamentally transform the United States of America.” To a significant extent he succeeded.It would be amazing to see what Americans would be capable of if the government stops making them fat, dumb and happy.
Trump should put the welfare system back on the states. The fiscal responsibility inherent in state budgets would guarantee a lower welfare budget.