‘For too long, the government has diverted hardworking Americans’ tax dollars to incentivize illegal immigration,’ the health secretary said.
By Catholics for Catholics
It’s over.
Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is revoking a 1998 version of a law that permitted illegal immigrants to get into specific government-funded programs, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) said.
The health secretary is rescinding the interpretation of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA), a law that said illegal immigrants cannot obtain “federal public benefits,” according to The Epoch Times.
HHS said the 1998 interpretation of the law’s definition of benefits “does not provide sufficient guidance for benefit providers” and that HHS was stepping in “to facilitate compliance” with a requirement in the law for providers to verify a person’s qualifications for benefits.
The 1998 interpretation said that certain programs, including Head Start, which delivers child care for lower-income families, were accessible to illegal immigrants.
HHS said Thursday that interpretation wrongly narrowed the scope of the law, permitting illegal immigrants access programs that lawmakers meant only for Americans and qualified immigrants, such as those granted asylum.
“For too long, the government has diverted hardworking Americans’ tax dollars to incentivize illegal immigration,” Kennedy said. “Today’s action changes that—it restores integrity to federal social programs, enforces the rule of law, and protects vital resources for the American people.”
The Epoch Times reported that the revised policy applies the definition of federal public benefit in the law. The statute defines the benefits as ‘“any grant, contract, loan, professional license, or commercial license” provided to an individual, as well as “any retirement, welfare, health, disability, public or assisted housing, postsecondary education, food assistance, unemployment benefit, or any other similar benefit for which payments or assistance are provided to an individual, household, or family eligibility unit.”
Among the programs included in the revised version and expanded list of classified “Federal public benefits” under the PRWORA is Head Start, HHS said on Wednesday.
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