Tag: welfare

No, Illegal Immigrants Do Not Make the Country Rich

There is a joke about immigration: “If illegal aliens grow the economy, then the countries they left must be rich.” The reality is, however, that rather than making the country richer, illegal immigrants cost the country money. The amount of money the government spends on illegal aliens each year is “the equivalent of $500 per American man, woman, child, and retiree.”

Every day, approximately 5,000 illegal aliens enter the United States. The media claims that immigration is growing the US economy, using this argument to justify open borders and illegal immigration. However, there are several intentionally misleading points here. First, the economic growth attributed to immigration includes the wages earned and taxes paid by legal immigrants, which has nothing to do with illegal immigration. The fact that legal immigrants contribute to the economy does not justify what is happening at the southern border.

Yes, every additional person living in the country adds to GDP; however, there is nothing special about illegal aliens that contributes more to this growth. In fact, legal aliens are significantly better for the economy because they pay taxes and are less likely to send most of their earnings out of the country. Legal immigrants are more likely to buy a home and pay property taxes, which fund local schools. They are also more likely to start a business, creating jobs.

Adding people to the economy who do not work or contribute only grows the economy by the amount of government transfer payments they spend. However, these transfer payments come from taxes already paid by citizens or from government debt that will need to be repaid in the future. Additionally, these transfers draw funds away from existing social programs.

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“The Food is No Good at All” – African Illegals at NYC City Council Complain About Free Food and Housing

African illegals at a New York City Council meeting complained about the free (taxpayer-funded) food and housing provided to them.

More than 1,300 illegal aliens from Africa swarmed New York City Hall on Tuesday after they were falsely promised work visas and green cards.

The illegals were lined up outside of New York City Hall as far as the eye could see.

Africans in Islamic garb swarmed the sidewalk.

Many of them are from Guinea and entered the US through the Mexican border.

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A Strategy of Disruption: The Dark Consequences of Cloward-Piven

Have you ever wondered why some systems or organizations seem to fail under pressure? Sometimes, this is not by accident but by design. One such design is known as the Cloward-Piven Strategy. In the 1960s, two sociology professors, Richard Cloward and Frances Fox Piven, came up with a plan that they believed would lead to a major change in the way society works. The plan aimed directly at creating a situation where the government would have to step in and provide a solution to the chaos created. Their target was the American welfare system, with the hope of bringing about a more Marxist society.

The Goals of Cloward-Piven

The Cloward-Piven Strategy had a simple, yet profound goal: to overwhelm the welfare system to the point of breaking. Cloward and Piven argued that if enough people were to demand their benefits all at once, it would create a crisis. This crisis would force the government to adopt changes, leading to a system where wealth and resources were distributed more equally among the population. In their view, this crisis would push the United States towards a system that was more in line with Marxist principles, where the government plays a major role in ensuring everyone’s needs are met.

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Illinois Moves To Cut Thousands Of Non-Citizens From Taxpayer-Subsidized Health Care

Illinois officials are moving to stop providing taxpayer-subsidized health care to thousands of non-citizens, including many illegal immigrants, in a bid to rein in soaring costs.

The Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services said in a recent statement it will start annually verifying the eligibility for two programs—Health Benefits for Immigrant Adults (HBIA) and Health Benefits for Immigrant Seniors (HBIS)—after enrollment was paused due to budget concerns.

“This process will mirror the redetermination process used in the traditional Medicaid program to ensure those enrolled remain eligible,” the agency said.

The plans include closing cases for people who are enrolled who make over a certain amount or who otherwise are no longer eligible for the program in which they’re enrolled. Officials also plan on removing legal permanent residents who qualify for Medicaid, which is a federal program.

“The redetermination process ensures that those who are enrolled remain eligible for coverage,” Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services spokesperson Jamie Munks told WBEZ. “If an individual loses coverage through the redetermination process, it is because they no longer meet eligibility requirements, or they are required to respond or submit additional information to prove their continued eligibility, but they do not do so.”

The processes are estimated to reduce the number of enrollees in the state programs by about 6,000 people, state Sen. Don DeWitte, a Republican, told the Center Square after hearing from state health officials. Those removals would result in savings of $14 million.

HBIS, launched in 2020, provides taxpayer-funded health care for seniors who would receive Medicaid coverage but can’t get it due to their immigration status. HBIA, introduced in 2022, provides the same state benefits for people aged 42 to 64. Illegal immigrants are among the approximately 63,000 covered.

“Everyone, regardless of documentation status, deserves access to holistic healthcare coverage,” Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker, a Democrat, said in one of his statements in support of the programs.

Many Republicans have opposed the programs, noting that some citizens still lack health care.

The costs of the programs have increasingly sparked concern among lawmakers of both parties.

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City of Denver Cut Employee Hours to Zero in Order to Keep Paying for Services for Illegal Border Crossers

The city of Denver has been struggling for weeks now to pay for services for illegal border crossers. Early in February it was announced that the city would start cutting some services for taxpayers, and unsuccessfully tried to blame Republicans.

Now the city is going to start cutting the hours of city employees, in some cases down to zero, in order to keep paying for services for illegals.

This is simply not sustainable and anyone with an ounce of common sense knows it.

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Massachusetts Spending $64 a Day to Feed Each Migrant, On Track to Spend $1 Billion By 2025

State records show that Massachusetts is spending about $64 per migrant per day to feed those in state care, a cost that is contributing to the expected one billion dollars in expenses to be spent by the Bay State by 2025.

The latest numbers show that the state is paying out $16 for breakfast, $17 for lunch, and a whopping $31 for every dinner every day, according to WBZ-TV.

The state insists that it is required to provide the free food due to its 1983 sanctuary city law, which was passed to deal with a far smaller number of homeless people in the state, Fox Business Network reported.

However, the right to shelter law is not exactly being applied as written. The law also says that those afforded shelter must be supplied with refrigerators and the capability to prepare food, but migrants are being given already-made food, not the capability to prepare their own.

The state is currently housing and caring for about 20,000 migrants, according to the Daily Mail.

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Inside Mayor Adams’ migrant debit card boondoggle — no-bid bank gets $50 million, border crossers up to $10,000 each

It takes money to make money, as the old saying goes, and apparently, it also takes money — as much as $53 million — to give money away.

Earlier this month, The Post broke the story that Mayor Eric Adams is giving out pre-paid cash cards to migrants.

Unusually for the mayor, Adams didn’t publicize this story himself, and his administration for nearly a month has failed to correct several public misperceptions about it.

One misperception is that the program allows the city to give out just $50 million to migrants.

No wonder the mayor has been reticent.

This debit card program — if you read the actual contract — has the potential to become an open-ended, multibillion-dollar Bermuda Triangle of disappearing, untraceable cash, used for any purpose.

It will give migrants up to $10,000 each in taxpayer money with no ID check, no restrictions and no fraud control.

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The Rich Get Richer: 50 Billionaires Got Federal Farm Subsidies

Think federal farm subsidies only help out struggling family farmers? Think again.

Fifty members of the Forbes 400 list of the richest Americans  – banking tycoon David Rockefeller Sr., Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, stockbroker Charles Schwab and dozens of other billionaires – got at least $6.3 million in farm subsidies between 1995 and 2014, according to an EWG analysis. And these fat cats likely received even more subsidies through the federal crop insurance program.

EWG matched EWG’s Farm Subsidy Database with the Forbes 400 list.  We found that the billionaires who received farm subsidies between 1995 and 2014 have a collective net worth of $331.4 billion, based on Forbes’ estimates of their wealth.

Some of the other notable members of the 1 percent who got farm subsidies include Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker, the owners of three professional sports teams, and the founder of the Bass Pro sporting goods empire.

Of the 50 billionaires, 46 grow corn, soybeans, sorghum, cotton, rice and barley – commodities that are eligible for both traditional farm subsidies and crop insurance subsidies. Only two of the billionaires exclusively raise livestock, which aren’t eligible for subsidies but qualify for disaster assistance.

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Virginia Senate passes bill to give Medicaid-style health insurance to illegal immigrants

A bill in the Virginia Senate passed entirely along party lines on Tuesday to give illegal immigrant children access to the state-funded comprehensive health care coverage. The “Cover All Kids” plan still needs to be approved by the Democrat majority House of Delegates before it will head to Governor Glenn Youngkin’s desk, where he will have the opportunity to approve or veto the plan. Virginia has about 251,000 illegal immigrants.

The bill was sponsored by Sen. Ghazala Hashmi of Richmond, who said that health care is a right for everyone. “We want to make sure that Virginia is living up to its promise to its children,” she said. “Currently, 88,000 children in Virginia currently lack access to healthcare coverage. Virginia stands at the 25th position in the country concerning uninsured children, this is a statistic that must be altered.”

SB231 bears similarities in eligibility to the Medicaid program in the state but states that it is to “establish a program to provide state-funded comprehensive health care coverage for individuals in the Commonwealth who (i) are under 19 years of age” who “but for their immigration status would be eligible for medical assistance services through the Commonwealth’s program of medical assistance services established pursuant to Title XIX or XXI of the Social Security Act.” Illegal immigrant families who are at 205% of the federal poverty level, or earn about $51,000 per year for a three-person family, would be eligible to access the health care.

This means essentially that the state is expanding a Medicaid style program to illegal immigrant minors. The bill also states that The Department of Medical Assistance Services “shall not disclose information obtained by the program established by this section to any federal, state, or local government entity, law-enforcement officer, or law-enforcement agency for any purpose related to civil immigration enforcement,” unless the individual consents or there is a warrant.

Republican State Sen. Glen Sturtevant spoke about the bill, saying “This session, Virginia Democrats have introduced bills that directly incentivize illegal immigration,” Sturtevant said. “They want to grant illegal immigrants driver’s licenses that are valid for up to eight years. Now, they’re also working to divert limited resources from low-income Virginians to pay for healthcare for illegal immigrants. That will cost Virginia taxpayers more than $100 million just in this decade.”

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NYC launches $53M program to hand out pre-paid credit cards to migrant families

Mayor Eric Adams’ administration will soon start handing out pre-paid credit cards to migrant families being put up in Big Apple hotels, The Post has learned.

The $53 million pilot program, run by the New Jersey company Mobility Capital Finance, will provide asylum seekers arriving at the Roosevelt Hotel with the city cash to help them buy food, according to city records.

It’ll start with a group of 500 migrant families in short-term hotel stays and will replace the current food service offered there, according to City Hall.

The cards can only be used at bodegas, grocery stores, supermarkets and convenience stores — and migrants must sign an affidavit swearing they will only spend the funds on food and baby supplies or they will be kicked out of the program.

The Immediate Response Card initiative appears akin to the state’s food stamp program, dubbed SNAP, which provides lower-income New Yorkers with a credit card to cover the cost of meals, and will provide funds based on the same scale.

The amount on each card will vary depending on the size of the family and whether any income is coming in, according to the details of the contract.  A family of four, for instance, could be provided nearly $1,000 each month, which comes out to $35 per day for food. Cards will get refilled every 28 days.

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