BUSH GETS IT WRONG ON SENATE WELFARE BILL

WASHINGTON, D.C. - In a speech earlier today in Charleston, South Carolina, President Bush commented on the welfare reauthorization bill currently before the Senate. Deepak Bhargava, Director of the National Campaign for Jobs and Income Support and Chief Organizer of the Make TANF Work! campaign, reacted to the President’s remarks:

“Despite rising caseloads and a continued economic downturn, President Bush is playing politics with welfare reform. Instead of working toward compromise on issues vital to the well being of millions of low-income families, the President tries to paint anyone who disagrees with his plans as an enemy of reform. Welfare reform is too important for the President to adopt a “my way or the highway” position.

“The President is flat-out wrong when he said, ‘The (Senate) bill would hurt the very people we're trying to help.’ The Senate bill has bi-partisan support and expands education and training, restores benefits to legal immigrants, and provides help to low-wage workers and children. While significant improvements can and should be made when the bill goes to the Senate floor, this bill goes miles further than the President’s proposal to move people out of poverty.

Activists working with the National Campaign for Jobs and Income Support will continue to fight to make welfare reauthorization about poverty reduction and not a myopic dispute over work requirements and participation rates.”

The National Campaign for Jobs and Income Support (NCJIS), a project of the Center for Community Change, is a coalition of more than 1000 grassroots anti-poverty groups that has been organizing since 2000 to transform TANF into a meaningful anti-poverty program. Under the banner Make TANF Work!, the National Campaign is spearheading a national effort to fashion a progressive policy and political strategy on welfare reform reauthorization.

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