City Limits • January/February 2005
It’s been a while since welfare reform was news. When the federal law backing Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) expired in 2001, the chatter about what to change petered out as legislators merely extended the legislation for a few months. Since then, the same process–anxious expectation, legislative wrangling, stalling and ultimately a simple extension–has been repeated eight times. In the meantime, the subject of welfare has all but vanished from public debate.
Welfare will be back on the Washington agenda as early as March, when the current extension will expire. Freed from election-year concerns, an emboldened White House and Congress are poised to push through a Republican remake of the Clinton-era welfare law.