President Donald Trump’s administration announced it will ignore an Obama administration regulation banning federal funding for religiously based child welfare providers, including foster care facilities.
Previously, these facilities couldn’t operate with federal funding if they practiced supposed religious discrimination toward groups including homosexual foster parents.
This move is the latest step in the administration’s push to improve the quality of care and reduce the number of children in the U.S. foster care system.
Trump’s announcement means that Christian providers such as Bethany Christian Services no longer have to adopt practices that are contrary to their beliefs.
The Trump administration is also highlighting its initiative to decrease the number of children in the foster care system.
“Last year, I signed into law the Family First Prevention Services Act, which is working to bolster families and keep children safely in their homes, when possible.
“This legislation gives States access to funding for evidence‑based prevention and early intervention services such as mental health therapy, family counseling, substance use and addiction treatment, and parenting classes. By allowing States to address factors, such as the opioid crisis, America’s sons and daughters are more likely to experience improved outcomes and hope for a brighter future.”
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) released numbers Oct. 24 showing that the foster care child population decreased from 441,000 to 437,300 at the end of fiscal year 2019. The number of foster care children entering the system stood at 263,000 in fiscal year 2019, down from 270,000 the previous year.
While this statistical progress appears to be minimal, Trump’s Family First Prevention and Services Act—which he appended to a short-term budget bill in 2018—only went into effect on Oct. 1, 2019, peeling away financial incentives to take children out of their homes. Parental rights advocates have long cited the Clinton administration’s Adoption and Safe Families Act as the force that created financial incentives to place kids in the foster care system to await adoptions, which states benefit from financially, courtesy of the federal government.
“It is encouraging to see the first decrease since 2011 in the number of children in foster care,” Lynn Johnson, assistant secretary for children and families at HHS, said on Oct. 4. “This administration has focused on primary prevention and adoption, and we are starting to see some better results.”
“Helping families receive the care and services they need before the involvement of a child welfare agency can help prevent a child from entering foster care. I am thankful for all of the local, state and federal agencies who work hard every day to find the safest solution for our children,” Administration on Children, Youth, and Families Commissioner Elizabeth Darling said Oct. 31 in a statement provided to The Epoch Times.
