Michael Steele on Welfare & Poverty Republican challenger, Lt. Gov.

Facilitated faith-based institutions to tap into resources

A: Working with our faith-based community. The governor has asked me to oversee that and really create it. And we’ve done that, given some obstacles that we’ve faced to do it. But we’ve done it in a way that is true to what the president’s agenda is in this area, in trying to create an avenue where faith-based institutions and non-profit organizations can also tap into resources that will help them continue the good work of helping people.

Government should have limited control over welfare & family

A: It’s your philosophical orientation, how you look at life. I think it boils down to how you view the role of government. I grew up where I came to understand government had a very limited role. Learned that first from my mother. I remember sitting around the kitchen table asking her, when I was about 15, why she never went on public assistance, why she never went on welfare, because I was seeing a lot of my friends in the community seemed to be dependent on this system. And I was talking to young guys who have girlfriends who were pregnant and they can’t wait until that first of the month to get that check. And that bothered me. There was something about it that didn’t make sense. So, I’d talk to my mom about it. And she summed it up very succinctly. She said, she didn’t want the government to raise her children. She thought it was her responsibility to find a way for her and her kids.