Clinton Eases Rules for Welfare Cutoff

Attempting to show progress on welfare reform without waiting for Congress to act, President Clinton used his executive powers Tuesday to make it easier for states to cut off cash benefits to recipients who fail to find jobs.

The president’s initiative would give states blanket permission to eliminate benefits if participants enrolled in a federal-state job-placement program remain unemployed after two years. Federal law currently does not allow states to impose such a requirement unless they first apply for and receive a federal waiver.

Clinton’s order, coming late in the welfare debate and in the midst of the campaign season, appears intended to blunt accusations that he has not pursued welfare reform aggressively. The initiative would be rendered moot by enactment of welfare legislation that Congress is expected to vote on this week and the president is likely to sign.

In announcing his action, Clinton stressed that his preference is to sign an acceptable congressional measure, which he hopes will be modified during the floor debates to meet his approval.

“We must not let this opportunity slip from our grasp, as it has too many times before,” Clinton told the National Governors’ Assn., which is meeting in Puerto Rico, via satellite from Washington. “I’m determined that . . . this will be the year that we finally transform welfare across America.”

Last year, Clinton vetoed a GOP welfare plan and Republican presidential rival Bob Dole has cited that veto as evidence that the president does not want true welfare reform. But senior administration officials said Clinton is likely to sign the measure Congress produces this time, partly because Republicans have modified their plan since last year and partly because of political pressures.

Dole, who also addressed the governors via satellite, criticized Clinton for failing to move quickly enough to grant states waivers to go forward with their own welfare reform plans. Wisconsin, for instance, is currently waiting while the administration considers a waiver request that would enable it to go further than any other state’s plan to abolish the current welfare system.

“We need a federal government that embraces the diversity of your reforms,” Dole told the governors. “We need a federal government that trusts your compassion and your competence.”

Rep. E. Clay Shaw Jr. (R-Fla.), chief architect of the GOP welfare proposal, said he was baffled by the timing of the president’s announcement, given that the House could begin its debate as early as today.

“He’s obviously posturing,” Shaw said. But he said he does not know “if he’s posturing so he can look engaged and then veto or so he can look involved and then take credit for signing our bill.”

Shaw said that, despite all of the president’s talk about welfare reform, his administration has played no role in shaping the measure that is now moving quickly through Congress.

Tommy G. Thompson, the Republican governor of Wisconsin and a leader in welfare reform, accused Clinton of trying to cover up a weak record on the issue that helped him win office.

“President Clinton knows that the welfare issue is a chink in his armor and he wants to minimize the adverse impact on his reelection chances,” he told reporters by conference call.

During his campaign four years ago, Clinton pledged to “end welfare as we know it” but Republicans took the lead on the initiative when they took control of Congress in 1995.

Under Clinton’s new initiative, all participants of the existing welfare-to-work program, about 20% of the 4 million adults on welfare, would be required to sign a contract committing them to go to work within two years. Also, states would be allowed to deny benefits to those who fail to meet that contract.

So far, 28 states have received waivers to either require recipients to work or set time limits on benefits. Administration officials said the president’s initiative would prod the other 22 states, including California, to move ahead with their own welfare reform programs.

Officials in California Gov. Pete Wilson’s administration expressed skepticism about the president’s proposal and stressed that it does not go far enough to allow California to carry out its own sweeping plans to overhaul its welfare system.

“We would much rather have comprehensive welfare reform come through Congress than piecemeal executive orders from the president,” said Lisa Kalustian, spokeswoman for the California Department of Health and Welfare. “It just impacts one portion--the whole system needs to be revamped.”

Although many states already have enacted comprehensive welfare reform by appealing to the administration for waivers to federal law to enact their programs, the Wilson administration has been waiting for Congress to enact its welfare reform before launching its new programs.

The GOP welfare measures would give states broad flexibility to design their own programs. But they would require states to force recipients to work within two years of applying for assistance and would place a five-year limit on lifetime eligibility for federal cash benefits. Legal immigrants also would be denied most federal benefits under the plans.