CAI’s National Policy Director, Amy Harfeld Quoted by NPR on HHS’s Action on Foster Youth Federal Benefits
SAN DIEGO – University of San Diego (USD) School of Law Children’s Advocacy Institute’s (CAI) National Policy Director Amy Harfeld was quoted in an NPR article titled, “Trump administration tells states to end 'orphan tax' on foster kids.”
The Trump Administration has directed states to stop taking Social Security benefit checks from children and youth in foster care—a practice critics call the “orphan tax.” In a December letter to governors, Alex Adams, the assistant secretary at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services who oversees federal child welfare policy, urged states to cease withholding survivor benefits that are paid to children whose parent has died but which many states currently keep to help cover foster care costs.
According to the article, Amy Harfeld has long pushed for reform. She says conservatives are joining because they see the question as "government overreach into kids' private assets. Because it wasn't the state's money to take and they took it anyway."
Adams argues that withholding these benefits—often around $1,100 per month—is morally wrong because the money rightfully belongs to the children and can help them with stability, education, housing, or transportation once they age out of foster care.
CAI, with support from funders, has been leading a multidimensional campaign to eradicate nationwide the practice of states taking foster youth’s federal benefits. A well-established leader on this issue, CAI is leading reform efforts at the federal, state, and local levels to protect the rights and preserve the benefits of foster youth. CAI issued a 50-state report card entitled, “Foster Care or Foster Con? Preserving the Federal Benefits of America’s Most Vulnerable Children.”
To learn more about CAI’s campaign to stop this practice, please visit our Preserving Federal Benefits of Foster Youth website.
To read the full article, please visit KPBS.
About the Children’s Advocacy Institute
The Children's Advocacy Institute (CAI), founded at the nonprofit University of San Diego School of Law in 1989, is one of the nation's premiere academic, research, and advocacy organizations working to improve the lives of children and youth, with special emphasis on improving the child protection and foster care systems and enhancing resources that are available to youth aging out of foster care.
In its academic component, CAI trains law students and attorneys to be effective child advocates throughout their legal careers. Its Child Advocacy Clinic gives USD Law students three distinct clinical opportunities to advocate on behalf of children and youth.
CAI's research and advocacy component, conducted through its offices in San Diego, Sacramento, and Washington, D.C., seeks to leverage change for children and youth through impact litigation, regulatory and legislative advocacy, and public education. Active primarily at the federal and state levels, CAI's efforts are multi-faceted—comprehensively and successfully embracing all tools of public interest advocacy to improve the lives of children and youth. To support CAI’s work, please visit our website.
About the University of San Diego School of Law
Each year, USD educates approximately 800 Juris Doctor and graduate law students from throughout the United States and around the world. The law school is best known for its offerings in the areas of business and corporate law, constitutional law, intellectual property, international and comparative law, public interest law and taxation.
USD School of Law is one of the 88 law schools elected to the Order of the Coif, a national honor society for law school graduates. The law school’s faculty is a strong group of outstanding scholars and teachers with national and international reputations and currently ranks 34th nationally among U.S. law faculties in scholarly impact and 35th nationally in past-year faculty downloads on the Social Sciences Research Network (SSRN). The school is accredited by the American Bar Association and is a member of the Association of American Law Schools. Founded in 1954, the law school is part of the University of San Diego, a private, independent, Roman Catholic university chartered in 1949.