Amnesty: Illegal Immigrants Eligible For Social Security And Medicare

Millions of illegal immigrants who received amnesty from deportation from President Obama will apparently become eligible for Social Security, Medicare, and other federal benefits.

Complicating the situation, perhaps, is that Social Security is on track to go broke by the year 2024, the Daily Signal has just reported.

Last month, Obama went ahead with executive action on amnesty, despite the fact that more than 20 times on camera he admitted that he lacked the constitutional authority to do so absent permission from Congress. Under Article 1, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution, Congress — not the Executive Branch — is empowered to establish laws for immigration. Under Article II, Section 3, the president is required to “take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.”

For fiscal year ending September 30, deportations have reportedly dropped 14 percent from 2013, and are at the lowest level since the Obama administration took office.

In a speech to the nation on November 20, the president extended amnesty to approximately five million illegal aliens who have been in the country more than five years, and/or have children who are American citizens, pass a criminal background check, and pay their fair share of taxes, although it’s unclear how the latter would be calculated.

The Department of Homeland Security is already seeking to hire 1,000 new permanent employees in Virginia to process millions of amnesty applications from illegal immigrants, which will culminate in their receiving Social Security numbers and green card work permits. Obama’s amnesty would be unprecedented if, unlike most government programs, it actually stays within its original cost and scope parameters.

Moreover, according a former official with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, “fraud will be a major problem for the new amnesty — though just how big is anyone’s guess, because the administration has turned a blind eye to those warnings,” The Washington Times reported. As a practical matter, most bureaucrats will likely rubber-stamp most applications for amnesty that claim to meet the eligibility requirements. Fraud could take the form of phony birth certificates or fake proof of U.S. residency.

As far as federal benefits are concerned, “Describing the administration’s position, one official said … that any immigrant considered lawfully present and holding a Social Security number would be entitled to Social Security and Medicare upon retirement because they would have paid into the system,” the AP reported.

Amnesty will cost the taxpayer $2 trillion, or $40 billion a year, over the next 50 years, the Heritage Foundation claims, in part because on average, an illegal immigrant who benefits from amnesty supposedly has a 10th grade education.

“That low education ensures they can’t earn enough money, or pay enough taxes, to pay for the many benefits they’ll get if they progress from temporary residents to legal residents and then to citizens.”

Illegal immigrants who gain Social Security numbers and green cards will also become eligible for the Earned Income Tax Credit and the Additional Child Tax Credit.

“As a practical matter, however, they will almost certainly collect cash. The IRS has neither the means nor the resources to deny EITC and ACTC to anyone with a valid nine-digit Social Security number. ACTC already pays huge amounts to illegal aliens holding only ITINs–$4.2 billion in 2010, according to the Treasury Department’s own inspector general. Once those ITIN holders gain Social Security numbers, it will become even less feasible to distinguish between presidentially and congressionally authorized resident aliens, even supposing the administration wished to do so–which of course it does not. So both the EITC and the ACTC are destined to grow hugely,” the Atlantic claimed.

U.S. Senator Jeff Sessions (R-ALa.) is not a fan of amnesty.

“This is yet one more illustration of the enormous cost inflicted by the President’s illegal action.He has now launched a new $100 million facility and staffing operation to provide illegal immigrants with the exact benefits rejected by Congress — including work permits, Social Security and Medicare. These credits will cost American taxpayers billions every year and represent an enormous cash transfer from American workers to lower-wage illegal workers. These tax credits are not refunds, but a direct cash payment from the Treasury to illegal immigrants — at a time when the Treasury is running huge deficits,” Sessions told National Review Online.

The illegal immigrants who are under the Obama amnesty umbrella won’t be eligible for other federal welfare benefits or Obamacare, according to the Obama administration. In fact, as the Inquisitr previously reported, Obamacare gives businesses an incentive to hire illegals over American citizens since the $3,000 per employee employer mandate penalty does not apply.

However, under the laws (or loopholes thereof) of various states, illegal immigrants do gain access to various social services, primarily on behalf of their U.S.-born children. According to an analysis published in 2011 by the Center for Immigration Studies, an estimated “52 percent of households with children headed by legal immigrants used at least one welfare program in 2009, compared to 71 percent for illegal immigrant households with children.”

Amnesty via executive order apparently is a big issue in tomorrow’s U.S. Senate runoff election in Louisiana between incumbent Democrat Senator Mary Landrieu and Republican Congressman Bill Cassidy. According to one poll, “voters believe that illegal immigration is the biggest issue facing the nation as a whole… the most important single reason to stop illegal immigration is the need to use tax dollars to support American citizens, followed by the need to protect the rule of law… President Obama’s decision to defer deportation for up to five million illegal immigrants by executive action clearly hurts Landrieu.”

Do you think amnesty for illegal immigrants will be a positive or negative for the American economy?

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