18 House Republicans Vote Against Resolution Recognizing Poverty

Last week, Rep. Jim McDermott (D-WA) brought forth a rather innocuous House Resolution expressing support for designating January as Poverty Awareness Month.  McDermott, a member of the Ways and Means Committee and Chairman of its Subcommittee on Income Security and Family Support, highlighted that in 2008, 40 million Americans were living in poverty.  Even worse, one in five children lived in poverty.  

These numbers are even worse then they appear.  First, the current economic recession has no doubt forced many more Americans into poverty. Second, as McDermott points out, the current threshold for determining poverty is grossly antiquated and as a result, understates the poverty rate.  For example, a family of four making just $23,000 is not considered to be living in poverty. In the midst of a pronounced recession, recognizing the existence of and reformulating efforts to combat poverty are important steps to real recovery. 

Such reasoning, however, does not hold water among some members of the Republican Caucus.  In fact, 18 Republicans, including Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN), voted against the resolution, presumably on the grounds that the bill suggests safety-nets "should be increased and that Congress should further increase education, housing, and other programs."  In other words, they opposed it because it calls for a more concerted effort to fight poverty.

Here are the Republicans who voted against the legislation:

In the floor debate on the resolution, Congresswoman Brown-Waite (R-FL) argued that the prescription for overcoming poverty was personal responsibility.  The 20% of children who are currently living in poverty, it would seem, must not count on government to fill their empty stomachs.  Instead, they, like everyone else, need to pick themselves up by their bootstraps.  The only question is; how do you do that when you don't have boots?