South Dakota Republicans’ latest spiteful, uncompassionate, and unconstitutional welfare drug-testing bill is officially in the hopper. House Bill 1076, sponsored by right-wing poster gals Rep. Lynne DiSanto (R-25/Rapid City) and Senator Betty Olson (R-28/Prairie City), would require every adult under age 65 applying for Temporary Assistance for Needy Families or the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (food stamps). Applicants testing positive for use of a controlled substance lose eligibility for public assistance for one year.
We already know that federal courts have found that laws in Michigan and Florida requiring all welfare applicants to submit to drug tests violates the Fourth Amendment as an unreasonable search. HB 1076 will run aground on these Constitutional concerns:
Constitutional challenges to suspicionless governmental drug testing most often focus on issues of personal privacy and Fourth Amendment protections against “unreasonable searches.” For searches to be reasonable, they generally must be based on individualized suspicion unless the government can show a “special need” warranting a deviation from the norm. However, governmental benefit programs like TANF, SNAP, unemployment compensation, and housing assistance do not naturally evoke special needs grounded in public safety or the care of minors in the public school setting that the Supreme Court has recognized in the past. Thus, if lawmakers wish to pursue the objective of reducing the likelihood of taxpayer funds going to individuals who abuse drugs through drug testing, legislation that only requires individuals to submit to a drug test based on an individualized suspicion of drug use is less likely to run afoul of the Fourth Amendment. Additionally, governmental drug testing procedures that restrict the sharing of test results and limit the negative consequences of failed tests to the assistance program in question would be on firmer constitutional ground [David H. Carpenter, “Constitutional Analysis of Suspicionless Drug Testing Requirements for the Receipt of Governmental Benefits,” Congressional Research Service, 2015.03.06].
Testing welfare applicants for drug use is scientifically and medically unsound and fiscally irresponsible. Seven states that have tried some form of welfare drug-testing have found welfare applicants testing positive at lower rates than the expected rate for the general population.
And to top off the disgustingness of their bill, Rep. DiSanto and Senator Olson include this provision:
The applicant shall pay the cost of the drug test.
Out of work? Having trouble feeding your kids? No problem: just pee in this cup to prove yourself innocent of criminal activity, pay us $42 plus service fees, and we’ll see about helping you out.
Such are the South Dakota Republican values of the sponsors of House Bill 1076: Representatives DiSanto, Brunner, Campbell, Craig, Greenfield (Lana), Latterell, Marty, May, Qualm, Rasmussen, Schrempp, Verchio, Werner, and Wiik and Senators Olson, Ewing, Greenfield (Brock), Jensen (Phil), Omdahl, Rampelberg, and Shorma. Click those links, note those phone numbers, ring these folks off their rockers… and remember their unconstitutional cruelty come November.
Disappointing. Would Rep. Lynne DiSanto and Senator Betty Olson really starve children because a parent failed a drug test? Are they unaware of false positives? I suggest they find worthwhile concerns like ending the teacher shortage.
We don’t have to frisk them. I’d settle for a daily BAC. Here boys and girls. Blow in this tube before you settle down to do the people’s business. Apparently, the GOP this session is also considering a ban on the sale of fetal tissue. I suspect that happens in South Dakota as often as sex-selective abortion. Do they sit around their dinner tables and think of ways to disenfranchise women and the poor? They have to be drunk to consider this junk legislation. Don’t they?
This is so angering. Lawmakers, who are supposed to have a handle on the constitution and be up-to-date and recent case rulings……. just don’t care.
Abortion, gay marriage, South Dakota voters, etc…… SD lawmakers will still push what they think is right. Courts be damned!
Just another republican back handed way to discriminate against the poor, can’t afford the test, don’t get the help.
Hmmmm…If we are going to view addicions as a disease, and without a doubt addictions certainly present and act like a chronic disease, then a symptom of the disease is drug use or drinking. Extrapolation – people expereincing symptoms of a disease should not be allowed to receive welfare. Granny with arthritis, you’re out of luck. 22 year old mother of 2 with breast cancer, you’re out of luck. My compassion runneth over.
From 2012, nothing has changed except the names.
Now lets get down to serious business here. Why cant people understand that the cost of implementing this program isn’t the only cost that the state would incur?
Once you take the money away what are these people going to do? Begin a new and improved life of crime? That would mean more people in jail for the tax payers to support both medically and for the day to day needs of those convicted of crimes.
How about the cost of taking a child or children away form the offending party and paying someone else to raise them? Then the tax payer would not only be on the hook for education but also medical, food and board, and full time baby sitting. The cost of this bill just went up a whole bunch more didn’t it?
Now lets tack on one more thing here, medical marijuana. Thats right some of these people are using pot in place of the prescription drugs that cost so much more then the pot they are smoking. Hell if they just used it for depression and pain they would be saving a couple hundred dollars a month. Controlling anger more drugs not needed because of the pot. I might add here that anger is one problem that cant be held in check by anything other then hard drugs except for pot, just ask a shrink.
The monetary cost of this program is really starting to add up isn’t it? If you expect these people to get jobs then you had darn sure better have jobs that give them a living wage. Ten bucks an hour wont do it if you have one kid let alone two or three.
Dont give me that crap she shouldn’t have had them if she couldn’t take care of them because our legislators have been busy challenging the right to an abortion for years now.
You cant have it both ways, either you have to pay for the children when they need your help or you have to give cheap easy access to birth control. If that birth control means the chance for that family to get off of welfare and onto the tax rolls then so be it.
Look, it could have happened to any one of us that are writing here. A wrong turn in life, a bad marriage that couldn’t be saved because of any number of reason, or the death of a spouse after the kids are born but still small. I dont know many people that choose to live on welfare because its such a great way of life.
The Blindman
koch bros can’t afford the test,either,but wingnuts will shovel billions of taxcuts at Chuck and Dave to assuage their hurting sensibilities.
One more thing here. If someone wants a UA, make the hold the cup.
The Blindman
Where is Jackley going to find the money to challenge the constitutional issues in court and lose some more? It has passed the point of defending anyone’s rights and is more likely another opportunity to line one’s pockets with lawyer fees.
I thInk we’d all like to know there is fairness and equality in our systems in place. As a farmer rancher involved in farm programs you cannot grow mj and not lose program rights or privileges. Yet I do not see drug testing for those programs or for a myriad of other spenders of state and federal dollars.
I’ve watched from my perch over the last 9 years, a lady addicted to pain pills for severe back injuries get a court ordered weekly drug testing required. She barely had money to feed herself but was required to drive 25 miles and pay the $65 cost if I remember right and lose the time at work. She was not given any treatment options.
Lynne DiSanto is now officially a fascist. Betty Olson crossed that line many years ago. These gutless wonders, and their pals in the GOP caucus, enjoy bullying people who are down on their luck. It’s because the destitute can’t fight back.
But if rules must be made for the weakest among us, they must apply across the board. Anybody getting any kind of government funding must submit to the pee pee test. That includes classic human failures like Olson and DiSanto. They should stand in the front of the line and incur the humiliation they want to inflict on people who can’t defend themselves.
Les, you are right on the logical extension of this policy: anyone who gets a check from the government (state, or federal) should have to pass a drug test before that check is cut. The list of those who receive government dollars goes far beyond the “welfare” recipients if SD; how about the farmers, businessmen (let us include tax deductions as payments), state employees (including legislators),even school students who receive funding from Uncle Sam in one form or another.
It looks like a prime opportunity to invest heavily in plastic cups – there is going to be a huge demand soon.
Would it be wrong to ask to amend this by also adding a mandatory drug test before purchasing a firearm or ammunition?
Lawmakers discovered long ago about how to squeeze the public out taxes without calling them taxes. No one ever calls them out on it either. Here is how it is done. It starts with the police (who really should have a pee test daily). They search high and low for someone to cross the center line while driving, it does not matter that the lines in the street are difficult to see, it only matters that they pull you over. They immediately give you a test to see if you are ingesting anything. If so, them merry go around continues. You are booked and have to post bail, if you do not have the ability to do that, it is the slammer for you.
You miss the work you have and you are terminated. You then have to sign up for the 24/7 program that is a tax for the right to work. You have to pay an attorney to get you work release. You cannot make ends meet and your family goes on the dole. So that is how taxation without representation works in republican circles. You can see how this plays out in Ferguson, Missouri with the only difference is a lighter shade of pale on who is targeted.
Now, what about those that must take a prescribed drug for pain as les and the blindman pointed out. The system of a pee test is going to get challenged that is for sure and it will cost the state a helluva lot more than 42 bucks a cup.
Blondie and Dagwood are just two more grifters in a long line of grifters who screw over the public with overbearing taxes that no one considers for what they are. Who gets the kickback for the UA? 42 bucks is a lot of moolah for smelling pee.
I’d like to see Federally Insured Home Loans require a drug test but I’d settle for a means to repay test first.
O, try this on. If you claim deductions for your children on your income tax, you get money from everyone else.
This could just keep growing and growing. Whats good for the poor should at least be good for everyone else.
One more note and I’m done. If you are an elected offical, you should be tested every six months. The results of those test should be made public, every time there is a test done. After all, you elected them to do a job. If they are drunk or high, they loose that job, and the bennies that go with it. Those people caught telling of an upcoming test should face jail time and a fine.
The Blindman
Are there other behaviors that we object to that we could also test for? Why stop at drugs, could we test for other “decencies?”
It seems to me that testing has been widely proved as being ineffective in multiple states as well as being unconstitutional. I seem to recall that Florida stopped doing this after finding that not only was the rate of users below the rate of the general population but the state had to refund the amount paid by the applicant if they passed the test thus driving costs up.
Why the cutoff at age 65? We have a lot of “boomers” who are in 65 to 70 year age group who grew up during the “tune in, turn on and drop out” of the 1960s and still engage in the recreational use of some substances
Yep…..out of the 7 states that did testing from 2010-2014 out of the 216,744 people tested there were 428 people tested positive….which leads to average of .0019 denial rate. This at the cost of over $500,000 dollars. Even if you require that the participants be required to pay for this, you are still requiring additional labor to do the screening process, as well as dealing with developing a process to contest the results. I guess this may lead to more jobs in the state, but it certainly is going to be more expensive then paying the .0019 percent of people receiving assistance that are also addicted.
Wow, even Governor Daugaard has said this is a waste of money and “somewhat insulting.” What’s happening to Dennis? He’s actually become reasonable over the last few weeks!
Too many South Dakotans are inflicted with intentional ignorance when rational facts and data don’t support their tribal nonsense.
Representative Lynne DiSanto and Senator Betty Olson should pay a dear political price for the hatred and shame they are spinning with HB 1076. I don’t know what it would be, but it should be a series of actions to hound them out of office, never to be elected to anything again. These two bigots need to be held up as an example to any office holder in South Dakota that we are not a state of haters and we do not tolerate bullies.
I’m hearing this afternoon that even Governor Daugaard isn’t in favor of this creepy legislation.
Lynn and Betty do nothing for society. Their constituents should be ashamed!
CJ-do u infer that the 2008 recession was a result of unqualified homeowners?
jerry-do you remember the twitter accolades of the incredible success nationally recognized, for SD’s 24/7 program? they don’t respond to challenges.
I assume betty stands in grocery lines behind slow SNAP ect users and gets heartburn and just can’t understand why “those people” cant be more like her, and then likely discovered a friend in di santo, like an SNL skit w/ Kristen Wiig. Gawwd wouldn’t that be funny? My assumption is also that Betty can’t understand why changing the name of Harney Peak wouldn’t be a good thing for everyone. these gals’ lack of compassion is similar to their governor’s.
Finally, the premise for this piss test is so flawed considering that science says addiction is a disease process, not a matter of will-power or some other bullsheit most of SD lives and breaths. What state passes laws based of flawed misunderstanding of science? of course, science could be wrong, as it often is. wonder why science has not broken addiction as it relates to America’s past-time? Addiction is a good business model. FRIABS, Les, the fact that judges still don’t understand addiction … is????
MarkW. -what is all this about Old Hag thinking you and I don’t know, Stacy Phelps, took down GearUp?
Leslie,
I infer nothing of the kind. If there had been any reasonable attempt at loaning to “qualified” borrowers the inflated housing market wouldn’t have generated the worthless paper that was sold to investors. My point is that someone in the real estate business probably shouldn’t be calling for drug testing as a stipulation for receiving help from government. The comment regarding means testing wasn’t clear and distracted from the point.
Flipper, Roger C., Governor Daugaard’s statement on HB 1076 is remarkable. Not only does he say it is “somewhat insulting,” but he also says welfare-drug-testing proposals waste money and added that it doesn’t make sense to apply Rep. DiSanto’s logic about testing welfare recipients but not testing other recipients of government benefits. Maybe Governor Daugaard himself will tell one of his favorite legislators to walk into the first hearing and recommend the amendment to require all legislators to pee in a cup or blow the breathalyzer before each vote.
Sounds to me like Daugaard has become a libbie, or at least a Conservative with Common Sense.
Wait! I used to be the past president of that organization. Sounds to me like the world is starting to coalesce around grudznick-think. It may drive Mr. H into a rage, but that is what is happening.
Grudzthink. Get your bumperstickers now.
That side-by-side picture of Ms. DiSanto and Ms. Olson is shocking in the similarity. Add 10 years to the left and you have twins.
Triplets, I think … you’re the 3rd, Grudz.
…”used to be past president” sheesh.
I think it is a great bill and I hope it passes. Most employees are subject to random drug testing. These people are getting welfare from people who are drug tested and pay for the programs they use.
I think the gov needs to get real and support this bill.
Mr. Curt, let’s not get silly now. Everybody knows that both those ladies need a proper haircut to match me. And yes, I used to be, because now there is a new past president. So maybe I should have typed “past past past president.”
I have a certificate and you can’t take it away from me no matter what.
Sam2, do you and the rest of the employees have to pay for the random drug testing? Or do you get a freebie courtesy of your employer? I’ll bet you would squeal like a widdle piggy if that 42 bucks was laid out to you man. It may even sound like this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uFeI7_z0_ik
Other jurisdictions have Tryed this and it was found that the saving were .01% of expenditures.
Now if we do such in order to show by example let’s test ALL LEGISLATORS and All Government Employees.
We may save a bunch of money if we test these other people who receive govt. money
Grudz has a certificate? Does that mean you are/were certifiable,Grudz?
If a parent tests positive and loose TANF and SNAP benefits will their children also be removed? What will the extra cost to the foster care system be? Are those kids better off in the foster care system than with their parent?
If they are not removed are those kids now subject to growing up in even deeper poverty because the family is now disqualified from receiving TANF and SNAP?
Why should families who test negative have to cough up $35 for the privilege of pissing in a cup? At the very least they should have their testing fee refunded. When you are poor finding an extra $35 is a big deal even if it might be refunded in 2-4 weeks.
More than anything this bill shows how some people are so privileged they can not even begin to fathom what it is like to be poor.
Sam statistics support that 1 out of every 500 people applying for assistance use drugs. These benefits are short termed not the pre imagined most people think they are. South Dakota averages around 3000 people in TANF so looking at statistics you would be denying 6 people at the savings of around $2000 a month, but you are going to have to hire screeners and additional people to work in these departments to handle this and develop a way to refute the results. The average state employee with benefits makes well over the “savings” you think is out there.
Tsitrian’s blog shows nancy phipps’ support for disanto and may’s obtuseness. MDs sometimes understand and treat addiction but other times just swim in their own codependent confusion.
Nick’s point is right on the money. Somehow the collateral consequences on children do not seem to matter anymore to people supporting this nonsense.
If we really cared about these families, especially the kids, we would support decriminalization of drugs and offer rehabilitation help to folks with drug problems, instead of jail, whether on assistance programs or not.
Typically intentionally missing the point republicans focus on “unqualifed” consumers as cause of 2008 debt debacle while in fact due to deregulation 12 of the 13 major national financial institutions were at risk of collapsing. Bernanki FCIC 2009
A positive test for a pregnant woman prolly results in the foetus being forcibly removed from the womb and sent to a good kristian home to be reminded,as it grows, what a loser its real mom was.(and some extra cash for cronys)
Bring on the drug testing then we can stand around outside handing out sesame seeds to all testees and freak out the drug testing Gestapo inside.
I can safely say this without doubt, Phipps is not missed in the VA system, thank the powers to be for that. From the sounds of her rant, you can tell it is directed at Natives in particular and ptsd veterans as secondary. These bozoheads do not even try to hide it. More government intrusion to punish the poor and disabled. I wonder who financed her endeavors.
jerry-Track Palin played hockey in school and was generally out of the game halfway through because of temper tantrums. He has had anger management problems for years/ I doubt pysd is the sole cause or even a part of his problems.
It is kind of troubling to see most of my conservative friends cheering this on. Ive been against it since this junk started gaining traction in other states. The people this will end up affecting the most is not the abusers of the wellfare state. Its the people who worked all their lives. Its the people who may engage in political dissent…next thing an officer shows up at their door with a small medical cup, or a saliva swab. For some reason there was a false positive test. Much needed benefits are shut off while the issue is resolved. Attorneys get involved. All the while, benefits an individual has worked their whole life for are shut off – taken away. My fellow conservative friends in sd really have a poor understanding of communism and fascism.
The records described by W R Old Guy and Madman show the results of drug testing folks on TANF and SNAP in several other states. The rate of users is less than in the general population and so small that the testing is a waste of resources. I wonder why DiSanto and Olson think their South Dakota neighbors are more likely to use drugs than low income folks in other states?
In today’s RC Journal (1-24-16) the editors and a letter writer make two excellent points.
The Journal points out that simply introducing such a bill hurts low income folks by causing them to “face the label of being potential drug addicts, whether they partake in illegal drugs or not. Just the simple idea that all welfare recipients should be tested for drugs paints all those on welfare with a very negative and wide brush. . . . Even proposing this measure, which has died repeatedly in past legislative sessions, hurts those who need the help and are hopefully striving for a better life.”
And letter writer Kathy Kling of St.Onge correctly points out that this proposal constitutes a war on women, since the majority of SD SNAP recipients are women and almost all TANF recipients are single mothers supporting kids.
I guess it is just another attempt to shame women and single or divorced mothers who haven’t been quite as lucky in life as Disanto and Olson. Talk about a lack of empathy or compassion; DiSanto and Olson ought to be ashamed of themselves.
If recipients of SNAP or TANF are going to be tested, then anyone who benefits from ANYTHING that government provides should be tested as well, everytime they utilize any of those benefits. So if you need the services of the police or fire department, you should have to pass a drug test before your house or family can be protected! Do these women want to pee in a cup in their driveway and wait for the results while their house burns down!
Good job putting the problem in vivid perspective, clcjm! DiSanto and Olson want to demonize and otherize the poor, but we all receive benefits from government. By the DiSanto and Olson’s logic, we all should have to pee in a cup for Big Brother every day.
By the way, as of yesterday evening, Rep. DiSanto reports that over 25,000 people had viewed her January 15 post announcing her intent to file her welfare-drug-testing bill. Ugh!
The main reason it was viewed is because people can’t believe how damn dumb and conniving she is. I wonder what the Catholic Social Services thinks of all of this? Her husband sells Catholic Insurance through the Knights of Columbus so there is always a way to rethink your purchase if you think that the gains go to someone who has taken social monies herself but does not want others to do so without hurting them financially. Maybe the Knights will pony up the 42 bucks a pop so that the poor do not suffer, that is what Jesus would have done.
Come on,guys. You know wingnuts would get slapped around by campaign donors if they even hinted that welfare recipients other than the poor and women had to pee in a cup. Imagine the indignation at that indignity to the koch bros.
To prove wingnut bona fides you have to pick on the least among us. That is gospel.
These people are obviously out of touch with the poor people in South Dakota
LOVE YOU REPUBLICANS and the SOUTH DAKOTA VALUES that was implemented by Thune.
Another prime example of the ongoing demise of the republican party. Makes good sense they want to remove the “R” from the ballot. Republicans have ruled the state of South Dakota long enough now and know very well the damage they have done. So when the whole thing collapses either by investigation or financial collapse, or both, they believe they will be invisible. Good luck with that. I am sure you republicans are proud of the low wages,voter suppression, right to fire, unfair taxation, and the other things you have done for the few rather than the many. I am sure thune will continue shining the Koch brothers shoes and Kristi will do what she is told to do. I wonder if rounds is working on a new profit making deal as the old one seems to have failed. So I say this proposal does not go far enough. We need drug testing for everybody that receives any government funded South Dakota money. Including contractors and yes…. all you legislators. How about it, lets go all the way.
And Vi, they want the poor to be our India-style untouchable caste. The sponsors of this bill want to scapegoat the poor as surely as Donald Trump wants to scapegoat Muslims, Mexicans, and the media that has made his candidacy possible. They want us to think the poor are the ones robbing us, not the rich cronies who get corporate welfare and corrupt programs like EB-5 and GEAR UP.
I have always wondered why a person applying for employment as a food server, hosekeeper, bartender or nursing assistant is required to take a drug test within certain companies and organizations but politicians, doctors, lawyers, and numerous other professionals working in a position of power and influence are not….it seems to make more sense to me that if your impairment due to drug or alcohol use can literally affect the lives of many people that THEY ought to be the ones that are under a constant scrutiny and be required to submit regular and random drug and breathalyzer tests….
I have always wondered why we all so easily surrender our civil liberties to the private sector.
I have had to pee in a cup so many times, I’ve lost count! BUT NOT ONCE have any of those requesting people/s, agencies and or entities, EVER peed in their very own cup. WEAK Extremely weak people that can’t put their pee where there mouth is. These groups include people that are with our children all day, see patients every day, leaders and owners of companies, government officials etc etc. They not only should be pee tested but breathalyzed also! If you’re a drunk, I don’t think that you should be sitting on any of the floors of the capitol. These people wonder why we all get upset about them cramming there illogical and ignorant opinions down our throats. Get out of my business and stay the hell away from me. I only want a teeny little life on this planet before I die. Give me some peace. I can’t help it that I’m disabled and low income. My life wasn’t always this way. You would be surprised to know what the faces of poverty look like. Quite making me feel worse than I already do. Your lack of understanding and judgment is sinful.