In the mid- to late 90s President Clinton pushed through legislation to streamline and monetize public adoption from foster care.
People who adopted sibling groups, minorities, and special needs kids from foster care received free adoptions, public healthcare benefits for the children, and variable daily payment of ten to over forty dollars per day, per child. And in some states, like Texas where the Hart kids were from, college benefits.
Before this legislation (and the change in the ethos on adoption) children remained in foster care for years and parental rights remained robust.
After the legislation some enterprising judges saw a way to monetize the adoption of low income, disadvantaged children.
I lived in a county and fostered in a system where the abuses crossed every line of protection to include coercing disabled mothers to relinquish their rights or face the threat of criminal charges. Women would be targeted while pregnant, their babies taken from the hospital after birth, and adoptions processed within 6 months.
The Clinton system was designed to move foster kids out of the system. It was designed to monetize the adoption of children who were normally left in foster care. While it may have helped some, it harmed many.
There is a greater than 80 percent chance that the Hart mothers received generous federal payouts to take their “kids from hard backgrounds.”
Which means tax dollars would have funded their household, bought the car they drove over the cliff, and have been significant source of income intended for the benefit of the children.
No one should get paid to beat, starve, and murder children
Who never had a chance.