Guess how many people have tested positive in Michigan's drug-testing welfare program?
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Right now the only thing that people applying for public assistance in Michigan are testing positive for is high levels of lead. Governor Rick Snyder, who should probably be in jail, had a Republican pilot program going that forced drug testing on people needing public assistance. The wording was something like “poor people are drug addicts who are using good white folks’ hard-earned tax dollars to buy drugs and sleep with your white children,” and the pilot program has been a success in punishing people for being poor and predominantly not white. But otherwise, it turns out it is a colossal waste of time and money and it dehumanizes people for being poor.
Not a single welfare recipient or applicant has tested positive for banned drugs in a Michigan pilot program, part of the growing practice of screening beneficiaries of government assistance for drug abuse.
The Michigan program began last October and covers Allegan, Clinton and Marquette counties. As of May, a total of 303 applicants and recipients for the state’s Family Independence Program, which provides temporary cash assistance, have participated in the pilot program. Zero have tested positive, the state said.When the program concludes, the state department of health and human services has 60 days to produce a report on its results.
Michigan’s governor, Rick Snyder, who signed legislation in December 2014 to launch the pilot program, declined to comment on the results so far.