Republican Crackdown on Aid to Immigrants Would Hit U.S. Citizens

President Trump has vowed to end what he calls the “waste of hard-earned taxpayer resources” by cutting off federal benefits for undocumented immigrants and ensuring that funding goes to American citizens in need.

Administration officials have said they would root out “illegal aliens” who are living in federally-subsidized housing. The Agriculture Department has ordered states to enhance immigration verification practices used to determine eligibility for food stamps. And House Republicans just passed a tax bill that would limit certain immigrants from accessing Medicaid and Medicare, a popular tax credit for parents, and federal financial aid, among other benefits.

The actions amount to an aggressive attempt to curb immigrant families’ use of safety net programs. Although Republicans say they want to remove incentives for people to enter the country illegally, unauthorized immigrants generally do not receive federal benefits given efforts to chip away at their eligibility.

Immigration experts and advocates for immigrant rights say the changes would instead largely be felt by children who are U.S. citizens but whose parents are undocumented or immigrants who are authorized to live in the United States, such as refugees and people granted asylum.

Twelve percent of American children, or about nine million people, are citizens with at least one noncitizen parent. Children with at least one immigrant parent are twice as likely to live in poverty than those with native-born parents, according to a 2022 report by researchers at the Boston University School of Social Work.

“In the name of wanting to take a harsh policy stance against immigrants, in many different ways the reality is that they’re going to be punishing citizens and other immigrants that have been eligible in the past,” said Shelby Gonzales, the vice president for immigration policy at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a left-leaning think tank.