Mitt Romney has just released a new television ad that challenges his opponent President Barack Obama over the new directive that gives states the opportunity to tailor their own work requirements for recipients of welfare.

The new advertisement speaks of President Clinton who in 1996 changed the welfare system requiring recipients to search for work or take part in programs for job training.

The narrator in the ad says that under the current Obama plan, recipients do not have to work or train, they just have checks sent to them. The ad tries to paint the President as supporting big government, liberal policies and that the government does things better than others do, said a spokesman from the Romney campaign.

The executive order issued by the president during July, allows states a waiver relating to work requirements, giving the states the opportunity to test innovative and alternative strategies in an attempt to employ people.

Romney and other Republicans have slammed Obama for eliminating the requirements for work. The Heritage Foundation, a conservative group said the actions by the president make the work requirements completely meaningless.

However, the White House administration fired back through a letter from Kathleen Sebelius the Secretary of Health and Human Services. The Secretary told Congressional Republicans that no policy that waters down the work requirements or under cuts the ultimate goal would be considered let alone approved.

Romney, while the Massachusetts governor, was one of over 24 Republican state governors who directed letters to Congressional leaders of the Republican Party in 2005 asking for more flexibility in the welfare work requirements.

His letter said that allowable work activity, more waiver authority, ability to run state programs and partial work credits were all important part of transferring recipients of welfare to the workforce.