John Washington III Says the Child Support System Was Built to Feed Itself — Not to Help Parents
In a Nov. 6 statement, John Washington III argued that Texas benefits from child support collections exactly as the system is built, that license suspensions and six percent interest trap parents who fall behind, and that as president he would rebuild the system around one rule: the money goes to the children.
John Washington III took aim at the child support system on Nov. 6, arguing in a public statement that the system serves its own interest before it serves either parent. "The system does not have the parents' best interest at heart. Not the mother. Not the father," John Washington III wrote. "It has its OWN interest at heart — and the State of Texas does not care, because Texas benefits from the system exactly the way it is."
John Washington III pointed to the money behind the program. The federal government, he wrote, pays states bonus money based on how much child support they collect and picks up most of the cost of running the program, so the more money the system pulls out of parents, the more money flows back to the state. "Parents are not the customer. Parents are the product," John Washington III wrote. "A system that gets paid by the collection will always choose collection over common sense, every single time."
He also described what happens to a parent who falls behind: the state can come after that parent's driver's license — "the one thing he needs to drive to work and earn the money to pay it" — while Texas charges six percent interest on a balance the parent already could not pay. In cases where a family needed public assistance, he wrote, the state can keep collected support to pay itself back first, and "the children wait in line behind the government."
John Washington III drew a line between parents who refuse to support their children and the system he criticized. A child deserves support, he wrote, and "a parent who can pay should pay — that money belongs to the kids." What he described instead was "a machine that profits from struggle, punishes people out of a paycheck, and calls it justice." His proposal, as a presidential candidate, is to rebuild child support around one rule — the money goes to the children — and to give a parent who falls behind a path back: work, a fair review, and a real chance to catch up. "Keep your license. Keep your job. Keep supporting your kids," John Washington III wrote.
