Uwaila Omokaro, Class of 2021
On September 21st, 2018, the Trump Administration's Department of Homeland Security proposed changes to the “Public Charge Rule.” The Public Charge rule, which has existed since 1882, is a section under the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA), states immigrants will be “inadmissible”, denied entrance to the United States or to a green card, if at the time of applying, that individual is “likely to become public charge”. An individual who is a Public charge is defined as someone who is “primarily dependent on the government for subsistence at the time of applying .“ Before the Trump Administration’s policy change, public charges definition of government aid that would cause a person to be deemed inadmissible excluded Section 8 (housing benefits), Medicaid, Unemployment, SNAP (food stamps), and other “non cash benefits”. Now, the new Public Charge Rule broadened the criteria of public charge from immigrants receiving cash benefits to “aliens who receive one or more public benefits”. Because of the change in criteria, government benefits previously excluded mentioned above will be used to consider an individual inadmissible for entrance into the US. The new version of public charge would also consider whether an individual has received or been approved for government benefits within the past 3 years as a factor that would make the individual a public charge.
Changes to Public charge could drastically cause poorer immigrant health outcomes by discouraging immigrants to enroll in Medicaid. Medicaid, a government health plan, covers primary care prevention, speciality services, and emergency room care. Without Medicaid, many low-income immigrants would not be able to afford life saving health insurance which would cause them to lose access to healthcare that prevents illness. In addition, the public charge policy change would dissuade immigrant families from enrolling in housing benefits and SNAP food benefits which could worsen health outcomes by leaving families without healthy food and at risk for homelessness. Although the public comment period of Public Charge ended on December 10th, 2018, people interested in learning more about policies that affect immigrant health can visit the California Immigration Policy Center.
Changes to Public charge could drastically cause poorer immigrant health outcomes by discouraging immigrants to enroll in Medicaid. Medicaid, a government health plan, covers primary care prevention, speciality services, and emergency room care. Without Medicaid, many low-income immigrants would not be able to afford life saving health insurance which would cause them to lose access to healthcare that prevents illness. In addition, the public charge policy change would dissuade immigrant families from enrolling in housing benefits and SNAP food benefits which could worsen health outcomes by leaving families without healthy food and at risk for homelessness. Although the public comment period of Public Charge ended on December 10th, 2018, people interested in learning more about policies that affect immigrant health can visit the California Immigration Policy Center.
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