We often hear about how politics makes for strange bedfellows, well Zaid Jilani at The Intercept writes about how although John Kasich and Bill and Hillary Clinton are now political foes at opposite ends of the presidential primary race, there was a time when they worked closely together creating the mother of all welfare reform bills; which was responsible for doubling extreme poverty in the US.
In 1996, the Clinton administration and congressional Republicans worked hand in hand to pass what they called the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act, colloquially known as “welfare reform.”
The legislation famously “ended welfare as we know it,” replacing Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) with Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF). The newly created TANF placed a time limit on how long the federal government would extend financial assistance to poor families.
Kasich was one of the legislation’s prime movers. After clashes between Clinton and the Republicans over earlier versions of the bill, Kasich introduced what went on to become the final legislation in June 1996. By late July, the administration and the Republicans had solved their disagreements, and a conference bill coasted to passage by a 328-101 vote (Bernie Sanders, another presidential contender, opposed it).
“It was pretty amazing today to watch the president of the United States come on television and say that he was going to, in fact, sign this welfare bill,” Kasich boasted on the House floor on July 31, 1996.
In 2012 The Nation published a piece on Welfare Reform-From Bad to Worse:
A stunning report released by the University of Michigan’s National Poverty Center reveals that the number of US households living on less than $2 per person per day—a standard used by the World Bank to measure poverty in developing nations—rose by 130 percent between 1996 and 2011, from 636,000 to 1.46 million. The number of children living in these extreme conditions also doubled, from 1.4 million to 2.8 million.
The reason? In short: welfare reform, 1996—still touted by both parties as a smashing success.
The report concludes that the growth in extreme poverty “has been concentrated among those groups that were most affected by the 1996 welfare reform.” The law created the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) block grant, replacing Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), which had guaranteed cash assistance to eligible families since 1935. Prior to welfare reform, 68 of every 100 poor families with children received cash assistance through AFDC. By 2010, just 27 of every 100 poor families received TANF assistance.
[...]
Arloc Sherman, senior researcher at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP), provides an excellent analysis of the National Poverty Center report here. He notes that while extreme poverty doubled, “it nearly tripled for female-headed households, which make up the bulk of the TANF caseload.”
The 1996 welfare reform law, was especially severe to single women and children many whom were members of minority groups.
Jason DeParle of the New York Times, after interviews with single mothers, said that they have been left without means to survive, and have turned to desperate and sometimes illegal ways to survive, including shoplifting, selling blood, scavenging trash bins, moving in with friends, and returning to violent partners.[42
So much for looking out for the interests of women and children.