Sponsors (5)
Official title: To establish a pilot program in which States may use consolidated funds, through Upward Mobility Grants, for antipoverty programs, and for other purposes.
Introduced January 6, 2026 by Blake D. Moore · Last progress January 6, 2026
The bill offers states stable, multi-year authority and funding to test coordinated antipoverty strategies with built-in evaluations and continuity protections, trading off risks that pilots could reduce individual benefit access, concentrate federal control, allow regulatory waivers that weaken protections, and unevenly affect local providers and tribes.
State governments can combine funds from multiple federal antipoverty programs into multi-year 'Upward Mobility' pilot grants to test coordinated strategies for reducing poverty.
States running pilots receive predictable, guaranteed grant payments for five years plus proportional administrative funding, giving states stable funding and staffing capacity to design and operate experiments.
The law allows contingency/emergency use of SNAP, TANF, and LIHEAP funds and permits temporary use of existing agency personnel/funds to help preserve benefit continuity during downturns, disasters, or transitions.
Individuals placed in State pilots may be barred from receiving the same federal antipoverty program benefits outside the pilot during the pilot period, reducing choice and potentially limiting access to familiar benefit structures.
States may choose to receive a reduced percentage (10–100%) of covered amounts when consolidating funds, which could lower benefit levels for participants compared with prior funding arrangements.
The requirement to enforce work requirements and measure compliance for pilot participants could increase administrative burdens and raise the risk that participants lose benefits if they cannot meet new work rules.
Based on analysis of 3 sections of legislative text.
Creates an HHS Administration to consolidate specified antipoverty funding streams and transfers related functions and proportional administrative funding to implement State pilots.
Creates a new Administration within HHS to consolidate and administer selected antipoverty funding streams and pilot a unified approach. It defines which federal assistance amounts qualify as "covered amounts," allows states or public housing agencies to run pilots combining those funds, and directs federal agencies to transfer specified administrative functions and proportional administrative funding to the Administration for Children and Families to implement the program.