Senator Chuck Grassley once had a legislative assistant who had a positive experience with adoption and expressed the need for child welfare initiatives.  He embraced the challenge.

He worked to advance the Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997.  Since its enactment, adoptions increased to 54,000 per year. Many states doubled their adoptions from foster care.

The Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 included funding he championed for grants to train judges and attorneys in child welfare cases. 

In 2006, the Finance Committee held the first hearings on child welfare in more than a decade.  The hearings led to passage of the Child and Family Services Improvement Act, which Senator Grassley developed as chairman.

Senator Grassley was a leader in the bipartisan effort to pass the Fostering Connections to Success and Increasing Adoption Act of 2008.  This new law represented the most significant and far-reaching improvements to child welfare in more than a decade.   It included his legislation to make it easier for foster children to be permanently cared for by their own relatives, in their own communities.

In 2009, Senator Grassley formed the Senate Caucus on Foster Youth with Senator Mary Landrieu.  The caucus provides a voice for foster youth in shaping the policies that affect their quality of life, with a special focus on older youth.