Michigan Senate Republicans Vote in Welfare Drug Test Bill

In one of its last acts of the legislative session, the Michigan Senate passed a bill mandating drug testing for selected welfare applicants and recipients. It was a straight party-line vote.

The bill, Senate Bill 275, is similar to a measure passed earlier this year by the House. It would require the state Department of Human Services to create a drug screening and drug testing pilot project in three counties. People who are determined to be at risk of drug use would be required to take a drug test. If they failed, they would be referred to a drug treatment program. A second failed drug test would result in the loss of benefits.

Senate Republicans originally wrote the bill so that children whose parents were cut off because of a failed drug test would lose their benefits as well. Because they care so much about the kids, I suppose. Democrats managed to get an amendment passed that would allow a third party to receive the benefits for the children.

The Republican-dominated legislature earlier this year passed a bill, signed into law by Republican Gov. Rick Snyder, allowing the state to cut off unemployment benefits for anyone who fails a drug test required by a prospective employer.

I’ll write a straight news article about this later today. But I’ll take a moment now to note that this kind of cheapjack, poor-bashing legislation is almost entirely the exclusive domain of the Republican Party. This is the kind of crap you get when you let them run your legislatures and sit in the governor’s seat.

Article republished from Stop the Drug War under Creative Commons Licensing