Governor Scott Walker attacks Wisconsin’s working poor
By
Gary Joad
6 February 2017
Wisconsin Republican Governor Scott Walker has begun a statewide tour with the former Governor Tommy Thompson to promote a so-called welfare reform measure, which is included in Walker’s 2017-2019 state budget proposal. The governor titled his new program Wisconsin Works for Everyone, and has pushed the usual and customary right-wing buttons to demean and slander the working class and the poor. At a Milwaukee news conference, Walker said, “We fundamentally believe that public assistance should be a trampoline not a hammock.”
To receive and keep access to Wisconsin’s FoodShare program, commonly known as food stamps, Walker proposes that parents with children either look for work five days a week, obtain job training, or show proof of employment for 80 hours a month. He proposes low-income and poor heads of household be given three months to comply or be cut off of benefits entirely or lose the allotment of food relief proportional to their “noncompliance.”
David Lee, executive director of Feeding Wisconsin, which advocates for the state’s food pantries, told the Wisconsin State Journal January 24, “The proposed sanction will reduce the overall amount of food available for everyone in the family, including children.” Lee pointed out that over 60 percent of FoodShare recipients are families with children. FoodShare is Wisconsin’s distributing agency for the US Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP).
A lobbyist for the Wisconsin Manufacturing and Commerce association, Scott Manley, issued a statement in response to Walker’s proposals, saying, “One of the biggest problems we routinely hear from our members is that the…