JOHN LINDER: “This whole discussion has sort of an Alice in Wonderland quality about it. We are talking as though hard working…”

“This whole discussion has sort of an Alice in Wonderland quality about it. We are talking as though hard working American citizens are being denied basic rights of employment. These are welfare recipients. These are people who have been on welfare for 2 years and did not get a job after 2 years, as the welfare reform requires. So they are doing 20 hours a week of public service. They are getting $8.50 to $9 an hour in cash and noncash welfare benefits without working for it, and they are providing 20 hours a week of public service because they did not get a job as the law requires. Now they want to require, in addition, they get minimum wages on top of that. For that, they get all the protections of the Fair Labor Standards Act, so they could possibly maybe get unemployment benefits, too, when they quit the job, and all the other benefits that accrue to people who go out and work for a living, find a job and support their family the way the rest of America does. It is dishonest, it seems to me, or at least misleading to try and convince America that these are hardworking people just trying to raise their families when in fact they are welfare recipients, getting $8.50 to $9 an hour in benefits from the taxpayers already, who now want to be paid for public service because they refuse to go to work.”