--- title: CPAC: Donald Trump Tells Americans to Get Off Welfare description: President Trump said during his CPAC speech that "it’s time for Americans to get off of welfare." canonical: https://time.com/4682003/donald-trump-cpac-welfare/ author: Tessa Berenson article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-02-24T16:26:56.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T03:30:48.413Z article:section: Politics og:title: President Trump Says ‘It’s Time for Americans to Get Off of Welfare’ og:description: The unemployment rate generally has been hovering at its lowest levels since the recession og:url: https://time.com/4682003/donald-trump-cpac-welfare/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt15a3b1819a861852/6988bbd08fd2ee818d355e99/trump-cpac1.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: President Trump Addresses Annual CPAC Event In National Harbor, Maryland og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: President Trump Says ‘It’s Time for Americans to Get Off of Welfare’ twitter:description: The unemployment rate generally has been hovering at its lowest levels since the recession twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt15a3b1819a861852/6988bbd08fd2ee818d355e99/trump-cpac1.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # President Trump Says ‘It’s Time for Americans to Get Off of Welfare’  by [Tessa Berenson](https://time.com/author/tessa-berenson/)  ## Tessa Berenson Feb 24, 2017 4:26 PM UTC  U.S. President Donald Trump pauses while delivering remarks to the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) on Feb. 24, 2017 in National Harbor, Md. U.S. President Donald Trump pauses while delivering remarks to the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) on Feb. 24, 2017 in National Harbor, Md.Olivier Douliery —Pool/Getty Images  by [Tessa Berenson](https://time.com/author/tessa-berenson/)  ## Tessa Berenson Feb 24, 2017 4:26 PM UTC President [Donald Trump](http://time.com/4672974/donald-trump-white-house-chaos/) said Friday that Americans should stop using welfare. “It’s time for all Americans to get off of welfare and get back to work,” he said during his speech at the [Conservative Political Action Conference](http://time.com/4681802/donald-trump-cpac-speech-media/). “You’re going to love it.” Current [Bureau of Labor Statistics data](https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000000) shows that the unemployment rate in the U.S. for January 2017 was 4.8%, up 0.1 percentage points from the previous month but down 0.1 percentage points from January 2016\. And the unemployment rate generally has been hovering at its lowest levels since the depths of the Great Recession. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4682003/donald-trump-cpac-welfare/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4682003/donald-trump-cpac-welfare/"},"headline":"President Trump Says ‘It’s Time for Americans to Get Off of Welfare’","datePublished":"2017-02-24T16:26:56.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T03:30:48.413Z","description":"The unemployment rate generally has been hovering at its lowest levels since the depths of the Great Recession","url":"https://time.com/4682003/donald-trump-cpac-welfare/","keywords":["Donald Trump","White House","CPAC","onetime","president trump"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt15a3b1819a861852/6988bbd08fd2ee818d355e99/trump-cpac1.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Tessa Berenson","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/tessa-berenson/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt15a3b1819a861852/6988bbd08fd2ee818d355e99/trump-cpac1.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"President Trump Addresses Annual CPAC Event In National Harbor, Maryland","caption":"President Trump Addresses Annual CPAC Event In National Harbor, Maryland","creditText":"Olivier Douliery —Pool/Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/donald-trump/","name":"Donald Trump"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4682003/donald-trump-cpac-welfare/","name":"President Trump Says ‘It’s Time for Americans to Get Off of Welfare’"}}]}] ```