New Primer Outlines Immigrants’ Eligibility for U.S. Public Benefits
WASHINGTON, DC — Expanded access to federally funded public benefits and supports in the United States during the COVID-19 pandemic vividly highlighted how such programs can reduce hardships for families and children, lifting millions out of poverty. The end of the public-health emergency, announced on May 11, 2023, signaled a return to standard eligibility rules and brought a significant loss of access to support for many low-income individuals and families, including immigrants.
As part of this post-pandemic unwinding process, for example, states are reverifying eligibility for everyone enrolled in Medicaid after a pandemic-induced pause in reverifications, with nearly 16 million people disenrolled so far.
In this moment of flux, it is important for service providers and others assisting the nation’s immigrants to understand the complex rules governing non-citizens’ access to public supports through programs such as Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), Affordable Care Act subsidies, the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) and federal student aid—something that varies both by immigration status and across programs.
A new report out today, Immigrants’ Eligibility for U.S. Public Benefits: A Primer, provides an overview of immigrants’ eligibility for 13 programs and services related to general assistance, health and nutrition, employment and income, education, housing and driver’s licenses, according to the standard eligibility rules that are back in force with the end of the pandemic emergency. It also includes a look at the needs and benefits eligibility of the nation’s large Latino immigrant community, which represents 44 percent of the U.S. foreign-born population.
As Migration Policy Institute (MPI) analysts Valerie Lacarte, Julia Gelatt and Ashley Podplesky note, complex eligibility requirements that can turn not only on immigrants’ legal status but also length of U.S. residence, type of U.S. work history, age and other characteristics “leave a confusing patchwork of eligibility policies that make many groups of non-citizens eligible for some benefits but not others, while others are excluded completely.”
The primer includes a range of tables that summarize federal eligibility for many legal statuses. While the focus is on federal eligibility rules, the report also highlights how some programs have state or locally funded equivalents that extend to a broader population, taking California, Illinois and the Houston metro area as examples.
The report was made possible through a collaboration with the National Association of Chronic Disease Directors, with funding provided by Grant/Cooperative Agreement Number 5-NU38OT000286-05OT18-1802 from the Department of Health and Human Services/Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (HHS/CDC). Its contents are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of HHS/CDC.
Read the report here: www.migrationpolicy.org/research/immigrants-public-benefits-primer.
For earlier research outlining historic poverty declines among immigrants and their children in the United States between 2009 through 2021, check out: www.migrationpolicy.org/research/poverty-declines-immigrants-united-states.