St. Paul, MN – Kurt Daudt, a politician who has made a specialty out of bashing low-income people, was elected speaker of the Minnesota House of Representatives, Jan.6, by the incoming Republican majority. Outside the House chambers, where the election took place, members of the Welfare Rights Committee loudly demanded that welfare grants be doubled and that aid should be extended to all in need.

The Welfare Rights Committee clashed with Daudt back in 2011 when he was pushing extreme restrictions on the use of EBT cards to get the cash from people’s welfare grants.

At the time Angel Buechner of the Welfare Rights Committee testified in front of the House Health and Human Services Reform Committee on House File 171. Buechner told committee members, “We would like to address the provision that makes it illegal for MFIP [one of Minnesota’s welfare programs] families to withdraw cash from the cash portion of the MFIP grant – and in fact, appears to make it illegal for MFIP families to have any type of money at all in their pockets. How do you expect people to take care of business like paying bills such as lights, gas, water, trash and phone?”

The proposal received national publicity, see Minnesota Republicans say: Poor people with money should be outlaws.

Over the past several decades, politicians from both political parties have pushed attacks on public assistance. Minnesota welfare grants have not been raised since 1986.

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