John Washington III Questions Whether Child-Support Enforcement Is Judged by Collections Instead of Family Outcomes

John Washington III turned to the history of child-support enforcement in a public statement on Tuesday, arguing that a system described for decades as protecting families has also, at times, punished them. The 2028 presidential candidate wrote that history shows some policies "punished families for having a man in the home," and he asked whether the government is held accountable for families' real outcomes or only for the totals it collects.

John Washington III traced the system to 1975, when the federal child-support enforcement program began, and wrote that part of its original design was reimbursing welfare costs. He pointed to 1999, when, in his account, a new incentive structure began rewarding states for collections. Families receive billions in support through the system, he acknowledged, but he argued that the size of those collections is not, by itself, evidence that the system is fair or that families are stable.

"We should ask who benefits, who struggles, and whether the government is held accountable for families' real outcomes, not just totals collected," John Washington III wrote. He closed by saying that fifty-one years into the program, "Americans deserve clear answers" — framing the issue, as he has throughout his campaign, as a question of whether government programs are measured by what they do for the families they claim to serve.