The Trump administration moved Thursday to block illegal immigrants from accessing taxpayer-funded aid to enroll in educational programs and receive health care benefits.
The departments of Education, Agriculture, Labor, Justice and Health and Human Services made separate announcements Thursday, touting savings of around $40 billion.
HHS called the change a “significant policy shift” that will “ensure that taxpayer-funded program benefits intended for the American people are not diverted to subsidize illegal aliens.”
“Under President Trump’s leadership, hardworking American taxpayers will no longer foot the bill for illegal aliens to participate in our career, technical, or adult education programs or activities,” Education Secretary Linda McMahon also said in a statement.
“The Department will ensure that taxpayer funds are reserved for citizens and individuals who have entered our country through legal means who meet federal eligibility criteria.”
Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins announced that states should also be preventing migrants from accessing benefits through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).
“The generosity of the American taxpayer has long been abused by faulty interpretations of 1996 welfare reform law,” Rollins said.
The Department of Labor moved to prevent several workforce development grants and resources from going to migrants.
States and cities, with the help of federal monies, have shouldered the bulk of the cost of the migrant influx during former President Joe Biden’s administration.
New York City has shelled out at least $3 billion to house migrants since 2022, putting some new arrivals up in luxury hotels like The Row.
Last year alone, the Big Apple received $81 million from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to help shelter migrants.
The Trump agencies changed Clinton-era interpretations of the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (PRWORA), a law that permitted some welfare and benefits programs be made available to non-citizens.
A number of HHS programs have now been reclassified as “federal public benefits” under PRWORA, including Head Start, a comprehensive early childhood education program.
“Head Start’s classification under the new PRWORA interpretation puts American families first by ensuring taxpayer-funded benefits are reserved for eligible individuals,” explained HHS Acting Assistant Secretary Andrew Gradison.
The changes are part of the Trump administration’s broader “no amnesty” and zero tolerance immigration policy.
Recently, that’s included crackdowns on states that offer illegal immigrants special education privileges and the opening of “Alligator Alcatraz,” a new migrant detention center in the middle of the Florida swamps.
McMahon’s department affirmed that the policy change will ensure “that postsecondary education programs authorized under the Higher Education Act (HEA), such as Pell Grants and student loans, continue to be inaccessible to illegal immigrants.”
“For too long, the government has diverted hardworking Americans’ tax dollars to incentivize illegal immigration,” said HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
“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.”
These changes are in line with a February executive order that directed Trump administration agencies to “identify all federally funded programs administered by the agency that currently permit illegal aliens to obtain any cash or non-cash public benefit,” and to “take all appropriate actions to align such programs” with PRWORA and federal law.
At the time, Trump argued that though PRWORA’s written policy does ban illegal immigrants from accessing most taxpayer-funded benefits, it fails to achieve that.
The president noted that over the past three decades, “numerous administrations have acted to undermine the principles and limitations directed by the Congress.”
In particular, Trump charged that his predecessor “repeatedly undercut the goals of that law, resulting in the improper expenditure of significant taxpayer resources.”
