and America takes another one in the........
Posted on 07/12/2012 2:43:10 PM PDT by Da Bilge Troll
Today, the Obama Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) released an official policy directive rewriting the welfare reform law of 1996. The new policy guts the federal work requirements that were the foundation of the reform law. The Obama directive bludgeons the letter and intent of the actual reform legislation.
Welfare Reform under Clinton
Welfare reform replaced the old Aid to Families with Dependent Children with a new program, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF). The underlying concept of welfare reform was that able-bodied adults should be required to work or prepare for work as a condition of receiving welfare aid.
The welfare reform law is often characterized as simply giving state governments more flexibility in operating welfare programs. This is a serious misunderstanding. While new law (the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996) did grants states more flexibility in some respects, the core of the act was the creation of rigorous new federal work standards that state governments were required to implement.
The welfare reform law was very successful. In the four decades prior to welfare reform, the welfare caseload never experienced a significant decline. But, in the four years after welfare reform, the caseload dropped by nearly half. Employment surged and child poverty among affected groups plummeted. The driving force behind these improvements was the rigorous new federal work requirements contained in the TANF law.
Obama’s Trick to Get Around Work Requirements
Today the Obama Administration issued a new directive stating that the traditional TANF work requirements can be waived or overridden by a legal device called the section 1115 waiver authority under the Social Security law (42 U.S.C. 1315).
Section 1115 states that “the Secretary may waive compliance with any of the requirements” of specified parts of various laws. But this is not an open-ended authority: Any provision of law that can be waived under section 1115 must be listed in section 1115 itself. The work provisions of the TANF program are contained in section 407 (entitled, appropriately, “mandatory work requirements”). Critically, this section, as well as most other TANF requirements, are deliberately not listed in section 1115; they are not waiveable.
In establishing TANF, Congress deliberately exempted or shielded nearly all of the TANF program from the section 1115 waiver authority. They did not want the law to be rewritten at the whim of Health and Human Services (HHS) bureaucrats. Of the roughly 35 sections of the TANF law, only one is listed as waiveable under section 1115. This is section 402.
Section 402 describes state plans—reports that state governments must file to HHS describing the actions they will undertake to comply with the many requirements established in the other sections of the TANF law. The authority to waive section 402 provides the option to waive state reporting requirements only, not to overturn the core requirements of the TANF program contained in the other sections of the TANF law.
The new Obama dictate asserts that because the work requirements, established in section 407, are mentioned as an item that state governments must report about in section 402, all the work requirements can be waived. This removes the core of the TANF program; TANF becomes a blank slate that HHS bureaucrats and liberal state bureaucrats can rewrite at will.
Congressional Research Service: “There Are No TANF Waivers”
In a December 2001 document, “Welfare Reform Waivers and TANF,” the non-partisan Congressional Research Service clarified that the limited authority to waive state reporting requirement in section 402 does not grant authority to override work and other major requirements in the other sections of the TANF law (sections that were deliberately not listed under the section 1115 waiver authority):
Technically, there is waiver authority for TANF state plan requirement; however, [the] major TANF requirements are not in state plans. Effectively, there are no TANF waivers.
Obviously, if the Congress had wanted HHS to be able to waive the TANF work requirements laid out in section 407, it would have listed that section as waiveable under section 1115. It did not do that.
Define “Work”…
In the past, state bureaucrats have attempted to define activities such as hula dancing, attending Weight Watchers, and bed rest as “work.” These dodges were blocked by the federal work standards. Now that the Obama Administration has abolished those standards, we can expect “work” in the TANF program to mean anything but work.
The new welfare dictate issued by the Obama Administration clearly guts the law. The Administration tramples on the actual legislation passed by Congress and seeks to impose its own policy choices—a pattern that has become all too common in this Administration.
The result is the end of welfare reform.
Welfare recipients are his voter base?
Just buying votes with our money. New day, same ploy.
“so why does he like Welfare?”
He’s trying to increase the number of citizens reliant upon government for their existence. It’s about 50% currently that one form or another citizens have become reliant for the beans on the table upon some form of government handout.
Same with food stamps. He’s making every effort through his control of the Agriculture Department to ensnare as many as possible into the food stamp program. They are even advertising to get people to sign up for food stamps.
The idea being nobody would vote against the man, the party that feeds them, clothes them, houses them, and of course takes so much good care of their health.
Typical of the mentality of the Left to use our money as taxpayers to provide them their ride. Use our money to enslave us.
Too late. It's done. This President has gutted the constitution and the idea of representative government in this nation. For laws he doesn't like, he orders his agencies to not implement or enforce them. The congress does nothing, the courts have upheld his right to do it. For areas where he can't get a law passed, he just introduces regulations. Congress does nothing and the courts have upheld his right to do that too. There are no effective checks on Presidential power now. Even the power of the purse, which was congress' ultimate threat, has been given up; we haven't had a budget in years and everything just gets automatically funded with increases anyway. So the President doesn't need congress (as this clown has gone out of his way to prove) and he threatens the courts and they comply. What would Hugo Chavez have done differently?
As a last resort, we can always withhold the money that provides sustenance for the Dictator, the Welfare bums and the illegals until the proper adjustments are made. However, that would take unity and a lot of guts. I doubt we have many Patrick Henrys nowadays. I could be wrong though.
and America takes another one in the........
How the #%@#*# can 0bama do this without consent from Congress? Oh that’s right.. He’s black and if anyone questions his actions, they’re racist.
bookmark
The Bible says we would be punished for disobedience by having ‘children’ as our leaders. Now we see what He meant.............
King Obama strikes yet again!
Articles of impeachment should, but will not, be forthcoming!
Thousands Believe Hoax That Obama Will Pay Their Utility Bills
http://cnsnews.com/news/article/thousands-believe-hoax-obama-will-pay-their-utility-bills
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k1FCmfo2Ft4
I just figured it out! Those who stop looking for work Re dropped from the welfare rolls..........that will REALLY make that unemployment numbers plummet. Does anyone think this will be reported by Big Media?????
This is a clarion call to the men and women of the United States of America: make a stand NOW. You must make a peaceful and civil stand now! When you stand you shall stand upon the Constitution. We The People must say enough is enough! We have had enough of the Executive branch going around the Legislative Branch.
President Obama’s motivations matter not. The results of his actions matter not. The methods that Obama has used to impose his will are unacceptable. We have a Law and limits on Executive power for a reason. Look at the DOMA Law, the Immigration issue, and not this welfare issue. The more people there are on welfare, the less money there is for everyone on the welfare rolls. By allowing the States to ignore the searching-for-work requirement yes more people will jump on the welfare rolls. This will mean less money available for them and the people already on the welfare rolls.
The Law excluded the Search-for-Work requirement from being waived for a reason. Now, without
Congressional action, President Obama and his administration has rewritten the law. In doing so he and his admin. have violated the checks and balances. They have made law without the consent of the Legislature.
He may have the purest motives. His motives don’t change the fact that he is acting more like a Ruler than a Leader. Who do YOU, the People, want running the USA? A ruler or a leader:
http://lifelightandliberty.blogspot.com/2012/07/shall-we-have-rulers-or-leaders.html
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.