Bush Welfare Plan Would Increase Work Requirements; Proposal Offers New Subsidies to States to Encourage Marriage, Continues Ban on Immigrant Payments
President Bush today will propose a revision of the landmark 1996 law that overhauled the welfare system, by increasing work requirements on people who get government assistance, while giving states new subsidies to encourage marriage and continuing a ban on welfare payments to immigrants, administration officials said yesterday.</br></br>Bush's plan, to be announced at a Washington Catholic church, would increase the percentage of welfare recipients required to have jobs or take part in related activities by 5 percent a year, raising it from 50 percent to 70 percent. The plan would require a 40-hour workweek, instead of 30, with accommodations for parents with infants or other special circumstances.</br></br>As a concession to governors and congressional Democrats, the plan would let states count 16 hours of education or other job preparation toward the 40 hours of required "work." "I think work ought to be the core of welfare reform," Bush told a meeting of governors at the White House yesterday. "In order to make sure that welfare reform works, that there's flexibility at the states, that there's recognition people need training or drug rehabilitation. But work ought to be the centerpiece of a good welfare law."</br></br>In highlights of the plan released by the administration last evening, the White House made clear for the first time that it does not intend to restore the ban on welfare benefits for immigrants who entered the country legally after 1996. Those immigrants were one of the main groups that lost benefits under the welfare law six years ago. Democrats are joining welfare rights groups and immigrant advocates in urging that those benefits be restored. A White House document labels its decision on that issue, "Safeguarding Against Welfare Dependency Among Non-Citizens."</br></br>As Bush aides have previously said, the plan calls for legal immigrants to receive food stamps five years after entering the United States.