mylowercase:

Florida’s governor recently signed a bill that will require welfare recipients to submit to drug tests. 

In case, like me, you missed it, Republicans in Minnesota filed a similar bill in February:

Eligibility; drug screening. (a) To be eligible for MFIP, [The Minnesota Family Investment Program is the state’s welfare reform program for low-income families with children.] an applicant must undergo drug and alcohol screening, to the extent practicable, following the established procedures and reliability safeguards provided for screening in sections 181.951, 181.953, and 181.954. A county agency may require a recipient of benefits to undergo random drug screening. An applicant must provide evidence of a negative test result to the appropriate county agency prior to being approved for MFIP benefits and prior to receiving an extension of benefits under section 256J.425.

(b) A laboratory must report to the appropriate county agency any positive test result returned on an applicant or recipient of MFIP benefits. Upon receipt of a positive test result, a county agency must deny or discontinue benefits until the applicant or recipient demonstrates a pattern of negative test results that satisfies the agency that the person is no longer a drug user.

(c) MFIP applicants and recipients shall pay for the full cost of each screening.

Kaaryn Gustafson’s fascinating study and analysis “the Criminalization of Poverty” looks at the popular public opinion that assumes that most welfare recipients take advantage of the system. Below is an excerpt.

But, first a Minnesota angle, read MPR’s exceptional report Misuse of welfare money is minimal, data show. The article also takes on KSTP-TV for a misleading series that gave fodder to the GOP’s bills on ”welfare reform.”

Now to Gustafson:

The word welfare is now commonly used pejoratively—as in “welfare mother” or “welfare queen.” We often hear the word welfare used to describe a bureaucratic mess or to describe economically and socially marginalized populations. Lost in these contemporary understandings of welfare is the association of welfare with well-being, particularly collective, economic well-being. Many of the current welfare policies and practices are far removed from promoting the actual welfare of low-income parents and their children. The public desire to deter and punish welfare cheating has overwhelmed the will to provide economic security to vulnerable members of society. While welfare use has always borne the stigma of poverty, it now also bears the stigma of criminality. This change in perspective has under-examined implications for both welfare law and criminal law. This Article examines those implications.