Biden Using Welfare to Lure Even More Migrants to U.S.

September 20, 2022

By Dale Wilcox

With the American economy in shambles, the Biden Administration has decided now is the perfect time to lure more foreign nationals to the U.S. with the promise of welfare benefits. 

The White House published a rule earlier this month which substantially increased the amount of welfare foreign nationals and green card applicants can receive without being considered a “public charge.”

Under the long-standing “public charge” rule, migrants can be denied a green card if they cannot financially support themselves, and need to go on public assistance. Under the new rule, which is scheduled to go into effect before the end of the year, migrants will have access to welfare programs, including Medicaid and food stamps, and will not be considered a public charge unless “they are likely at any time to become primarily dependent on the government.” 

Predictably, anti-borders activists are thrilled with the new rule. 

“This allows our borders to remain open to a large portion of the world where immigrants struggle and seek the American dream,” American Immigration Lawyers Association Immediate Past President Allen Orr told the Daily Caller News Foundation earlier this month. 

The new rule fully unravels a previous public charge rule put in place by the Trump Administration in 2019, which expanded the number of welfare programs that would make a green card applicant a public charge. This, alongside the Remain in Mexico program and other immigration enforcement actions, dramatically reduced the flow of migrants at our border during the final two years of the Trump presidency. 

Joe Biden subsequently reversed these actions, and now the crisis at the border is worse than ever. And, while lavishly-funded anti-borders special interest groups are energized, the American people are once again facing the myriad negative consequences of Biden’s immigration agenda. 

If the prior administration’s modus operandi was “America First,” the current one’s can be fairly describes as “America Last.” Every decision this administration makes when it comes to immigration policy reduces our security and places the interests of foreign nationals over the interests of the American people. It should be common sense to say that elected officials in the U.S. should prioritize the interests of the American people. The Biden Administration’s whittling down of the public charge rule is just the latest example of them doing exactly the opposite. 

The impact that mass migration is having on the ability of city and state governments to provide social services to its citizens has already been seen throughout the U.S. American cities have become filled with illegal aliens overcrowding homeless shelters, and taking up food and housing resources that are supposed to be for American citizens. Nearly five million illegal aliens have crossed the border since Biden took office, according to a study from the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR). The promise of government benefits will almost certainly lure more illegals across the border, as well as open up our system to more bogus asylum claims. 

Biden’s porous border has also caused a record number of migrant deaths at our border. Young Americans are dying in historic numbers from drug overdoses, mostly due to the large amount of fentanyl flooding through our southern border. There’s also the pesky matter of inflation, which is currently at near-record highs in the U.S. Gutting the public charge rule will cost taxpayers more money and deprive poor Americans of public assistance. It’s yet another example of how anti-borders policies lead to the gradual but steady decline of our nation.

Dale L. Wilcox is executive director and general counsel for the Immigration Reform Law Institute, a public interest law firm working to defend the rights and interests of the American people from the negative effects of mass migration

Also published at The New American, September 20, 2022.