Denny Rehberg Quotes

You see, the poverty program for the last five years have been buy-off programs.

I don't believe in welfare.

You need to support human development and human capital as much as possible. And we've had 25 years of programs, great programs. We supported 125,000 surgeries. We fund 15,000 scholarships every year for college and higher education. We gave bicycles for rural areas. We gave laptops.

Pell Grants aren't 'welfare,' they are a gateway to opportunity for some of our nation's best and brightest students.

Michelle and I—we’re where we are today only because scholarships and student loans gave us a shot at a great education.

Because of the British Welfare State …, I was never hungry…. The schools I attended were free and actually acted as ladders of mobility for those randomly given the skills in the genetic lottery of life to climb them.

If not for food stamps, Medicaid, and various job programs, I would never have gone on to be the first in my family to go to college, the first black woman to represent my ward on the Cleveland City Council, and, ultimately, a State Senator.

Most Americans get that there is a need for a safety net in our country, and we support that safety net.

I've been on food stamps and welfare, did anybody help me out? No. No.

You know where nice people end up? On welfare.

Ultimately, my proposal isn't intended to increase or decrease the amount of federal spending spent on antipoverty programs.

When have handouts ever worked? In the United States, we learned that welfare for our own citizens not only turned into a debilitating crutch, it created a more or less permanent underclass.

I believe that access to a university education should be based on the ability to learn, not what people can afford. I think there is no more nauseating a sight than politicians pulling up the ladder of opportunity behind them.

The College Access and Opportunity Act addresses the important need to make higher education more affordable and easier to access for low and middle-income students.

Before this learning experience, I had assumed that with regard to programs that sought to help people out of poverty, the political world was essentially divided into two camps: conservatives who opposed these for a variety of reasons, and liberals who supported them.

If you are born into a family below the national median income, we provide you with an additional $500, and for every contribution made to a child's account below the national median income, we match it dollar for dollar - the federal government will.

You need education. You need subsistence protection. We need jobs and social security. These are preconditions under which it will perhaps be possible to deal with these complex circumstances.

Too many Mainers are dependent on government handouts. Government dependency has not - and never will - create prosperity.

Funding and maintaining programs from Head Start to Pell Grants must be a high priority.

So if a college education is indispensable, the challenge as I see it is how to make it more accessible.

I was raised in a Bronx public housing project, but studied at two of the nation's finest universities. I did work as an assistant district attorney, prosecuting violent crimes that devastate our communities.

I grew up in poverty. For 25 years I was fed on aid.

Further Education should be about the ability to learn, not the ability to pay - everyone who is able should have the opportunity, regardless of their family background. I don't want to see students struggling with huge debts or frightened off even going to university in the first place.

So you can go to college on Pell Grants - maybe I should not be telling anybody this because it's turning out to be the welfare of the 21st century.

I am for doing good to the poor, but I differ in opinion about the means. I think the best way of doing good to the poor is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it.