Latest news with #legalimmigrants
CBS News
04-07-2025
- Health
- CBS News
President Trump's "big, beautiful bill" threatens Medicaid access for millions in Florida, advocates warn
Millions of Floridians could lose access to life-saving Medicaid coverage under a new legislation that slashes billions of dollars in federal funding, health advocates warn. The Florida Health Justice Project estimates the legislation will cut about $4 billion annually in federal Medicaid support to the state, impacting at least one million current recipients. While it's unclear exactly who will lose coverage, advocates say the most vulnerable populations — including elderly residents who rely on Medicaid to help pay for Medicare premiums and legal immigrants with temporary status — will be among the first affected. "There's really just one step away from sheer panic," said Lynn Hearn of the Florida Health Justice Project. "If you have a person with a severe disability, they are relying upon the services of Medicaid literally to stay alive." In Florida, roughly four million low-income individuals or people with disabilities depend on Medicaid, the government-funded health insurance program. Florida residents with disabilities fear tighter Medicaid restrictions Paolo Linares, a Liberty City resident, is among them. Diagnosed with autism and ADHD, she lives at home but was hoping to gain independence by moving out. She said the new restrictions could make Medicaid inaccessible when she needs it most. "This type of paperwork may make it harder in the case that I may need it," Linares said. "If you're going to put more stricter things on this, what are you going to do to help these people?" Clinics may close as Medicaid cuts ripple through Florida's health system The ripple effects could reach beyond Medicaid recipients. Hearn said as fewer people are able to seek care, medical providers may not be able to stay in business — affecting access for even those who remain insured. "When there aren't as many people who are insured and able to go to the doctor and get services, then those service providers aren't able to maintain their business," she said. "And then they shut down." Among those expected to lose coverage are refugees, asylum seekers, parolees, and others from countries like Afghanistan and Syria who are in the U.S. legally but lack permanent resident status. "These are people who have been able to get coverage for their families, but that will end," Hearn said. She added that the next state budget cycle will likely force Florida to make tough choices about what Medicaid benefits to continue funding. For now, the Florida Health Justice Project said it will focus efforts on lobbying state lawmakers to secure alternative funding for the program.
Fox News
19-06-2025
- Politics
- Fox News
Fox News Poll: Voters view legal immigration as helpful, favor deporting those who are here illegally
Two weeks after federal raids in Los Angeles spurred nationwide protests on immigration policy, the latest Fox News national survey finds many voters think legal immigrants help the country – while also favoring deporting those who are here illegally. Seventy percent think legal immigrants help the U.S. rather than hurt it (22%). That's up 15 points from two years ago when 55% said they help. The increase is mostly driven by a sharp increase in the number of Republicans who think legal immigrants help the country (61% vs. 35% in 2023). At the same time, a 56% majority favors deporting those who are in the U.S. illegally. That's down from 63% since March and a high of 67% in October 2024 and December 2023. Most Republicans (87%) and more than half of Independents (54%) favor deporting those here illegally, while two-thirds of Democrats oppose it (67%). More Hispanic voters believe legal immigrants help (68%) than hurt (24%), but they are split on deporting illegal immigrants (49% favor, 48% oppose). On June 6, federal agents carried out immigration enforcement raids in Los Angeles that prompted nationwide protests aimed at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency, or ICE, and President Donald Trump's immigration policies. In response, Trump mobilized the National Guard and U.S. military to assist federal agents and local law enforcement – to which state and local officials, including California Gov. Gavin Newsom, objected. Nearly half of voters (46%) approve of the job ICE is doing, and disapproval has increased from 41% in 2018 to 49% in 2019 to 52% today. Attitudes toward ICE are driven by partisanship, as more than 8 in 10 Democrats disapprove, while an equal number of Republicans approve. Almost two-thirds of Independents disapprove. "Trump is on sure footing when he tries to remove people who are in the country illegally," says Republican pollster Daron Shaw, who conducts the Fox News Poll with Democratic counterpart Chris Anderson. "But Democrats and some independents are susceptible to the claim that the ICE raids are heavy-handed and cast the net too broadly." By a 6-point margin, more voters favor local governments cooperating with ICE in enforcing federal immigration policies than support allowing them to have full control over immigration enforcement in their communities (51% vs. 45%). Divisions are stark as men, White voters, voters ages 65 and over, and Republicans prefer local governments cooperating with immigration enforcement, while nonwhite voters, voters under age 30, and Democrats favor local leaders having full control. Views among women are split. When it comes to protesting ICE and federal immigration enforcement, voters split: 49% say it is appropriate, and the same number say inappropriate. On Trump's response to the protests, by a 5-point margin, more say sending in the National Guard and U.S. military was inappropriate (52%) versus appropriate (47%). Those most likely to say the protests are appropriate while also saying that sending the armed forces is inappropriate are Democratic men, Hispanic voters, women with a college degree, and voters under 30. Those most likely to disapprove of the protests while also supporting military involvement are Republican women, conservatives, White evangelical Christians, and Whites without a college degree. Independents think both actions are inappropriate. Overall, more than half (52%) say sending the National Guard made things worse compared to one-third thinking it made things better (34%). A slim majority of voters say the Trump administration's enforcement of immigration policies have gone too far (53%). That's more than twice as many who think they haven't gone far enough (21%). One quarter feel they are about right (26%). Even so, voters are split on whether these policies make the U.S. safer (39% safe, 39% less safe, 22% make no difference). In general, about two-thirds are concerned about illegal immigration (67% extremely or very), domestic use of U.S. military troops (66%), and protests in U.S. cities (63%), but these issues draw the least concern of eight issues tested in the poll. The future of the U.S. (85% extremely or very concerned), inflation (84%), government spending (80%), Iran getting a nuclear bomb (78%), and antisemitism (69%) are more worrisome to voters. More Democrats (87%) and Independents (71%) express concern about the deployment of federal troops in cities in response to anti-ICE protests than Republicans (42%). Conversely, more Republicans (84%) worry about illegal immigration than Independents (68%) and Democrats (49%). Trump's best job rating is on border security as 53% approve (46% disapprove). Immigration is his next highest, but he's still underwater here (46% approve, 53% disapprove). It helps that Democrats give him double-digit approval on both (19% approve on border security, 11% immigration). Overall, 46% approve of Trump's job performance, while 54% disapprove. Trump's personal favorable rating stands at 45% favorable, 55% unfavorable – similar to last month. Newsom's favorable rating sits lower than the president's, at 39% favorable (45% unfavorable) – still, that's a 4-point improvement from last July. Some 16% are unable to rate Newsom. Earlier this month, Trump signed an executive order barring citizens from 12 African and Middle Eastern countries from traveling to the U.S. Voters split on the action, with 48% approving it, while the same number disapproves. Eight years ago, when Trump ordered a similar ban, voters were more decisive. At that time, 43% approved and 54% disapproved of banning citizens from six countries in the same regions. Conducted June 13-16, 2025, under the direction of Beacon Research (D) and Shaw & Company Research (R), this Fox News survey includes interviews with a sample of 1,003 registered voters randomly selected from a national voter file. Respondents spoke with live interviewers on landlines (149) and cellphones (566) or completed the survey online after receiving a text (288). Results based on the full sample have a margin of sampling error of ±3 percentage points. Sampling error for results among subgroups is higher. In addition to sampling error, question wording and order can influence results. Weights are generally applied to age, race, education, and area variables to ensure the demographics are representative of the registered voter population. Sources for developing weight targets include the American Community Survey, Fox News Voter Analysis, and voter file data.
Yahoo
31-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
‘They are the backbone': Trump's targeting of legal immigrants threatens health sector
The Trump administration's efforts to strip protections from more than half a million legal immigrants could devastate the health sector, endangering care for the elderly and worsening rates of both chronic and infectious diseases. Hundreds of thousands of health care workers, including an estimated 30,000 legal immigrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela, are at risk of being deported — worrying providers and patients who rely on them for everything from nursing and physical therapy to maintenance, janitorial, foodservice and housekeeping work. Goodwin Living, a faith-based, not-for-profit elder care complex just across the Potomac River from D.C., is poised to lose 65 staff members following Supreme Court rulings on Friday and earlier in May that gavethe Trump administration permission to terminate humanitarian parole and temporary protected status issued by prior presidents to migrants from several countries plagued by poverty and violence. 'I just can't even imagine the impact it would have on those of us that are cared for on a daily basis if we were to suddenly lose them,' said Jill Miller, who has resided at Goodwin Living for eight years with her husband Carl. 'They're the backbone.' Goodwin is one of hundreds of long-term care facilities around the country that employ immigrants whose legal status will soon end, and its leaders have joined a chorus of providers from Florida to California warning that the Trump administration's crackdown will decimate care capacity and facilitate the spread of communicable diseases, putting U.S. citizens at risk. These vulnerabilities underscore the precarity of the nation's patchwork immigration system. Immigrants — both documented and undocumented — make up a disproportionate share of the health care workforce, particularly in areas like long-term care for the elderly and people with disabilities, and their expulsion would make existing shortages much worse. Yet Congress' decades-long inability to enact permanent fixes has left millions dependent on executive actions and discretionary programs that can be upended every time a new administration takes power — a situation people on all sides of the immigration debate agree is unsustainable. Even conservatives who favor President Donald Trump's decision to end humanitarian parole and temporary protected status acknowledge that doing so could harm several sectors of the economy — including agriculture and construction in addition to health care — but they argue the Biden administration misused those programs as a backdoor means of ushering in more permanent migration. 'There are valid concerns, absolutely,' said Simon Hankinson, a senior research fellow at the Heritage Foundation. 'But the solution we need is for Congress to determine what level of immigration we need, what skill level we need, what the conditions are, and then to pass laws. You can't just completely bypass Congress with executive action on immigration and expect this fragile edifice that we set up to survive.' The administration, meanwhile, dismisses the health industry's concerns. 'The assertion that the only way we can take care of our seniors is by allowing unvetted illegal aliens and foreigners with criminal records to remain in the country is grossly false and lazy,' DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement to POLITICO. 'If people want to come to our country to be caregivers for our seniors, they need to do that by coming here the legal way.' When asked specifically about workers with temporary protected status and humanitarian parole — who entered the country legally after being vetted and sponsored — the agency did not respond. Past presidents have extended legal protections and work permits to hundreds of thousands of immigrants under those programs because they face dangerous conditions in their home countries. The Trump administration is simultaneously ramping up enforcement, including in formerly off-limits spaces like hospitals and clinics. That's causing immigrants and their citizen relatives to avoid all kinds of medical care — from testing and treatment for infectious diseases to preventive care for chronic conditions like diabetes, driving up costs for taxpayers and threatening public health more broadly. 'If they're afraid to even go to work or send their kids to school, they're certainly afraid to come to doctors' visits,' said Sandy Reding, an emergency room nurse in Bakersfield and the president of the California Nurses Association. 'They're not seeking medical attention when they should, and we're seeing time and time again that those delays in care are making things worse.' Reding said an uptick in Immigration and Customs Enforcement activity targeting her area's large population of migrant farmworkers has caused many to avoid care for conditions like diabetes and elevated blood pressure — leading to preventable amputations or strokes. 'And when it comes to things like measles and bird flu that are easily spread, it poses a threat to the whole community,' she said. 'The quality of care will be poor' A study published in the medical journal JAMA in April calculated that about a million non-citizen immigrants work in health care, including more than 366,500 who are undocumented. And no sector of the sprawling health care system would be harder hit by mass deportations than long-term care for the elderly and people with disabilities — where immigrants make up nearly 30 percent of the direct care workforce. In an amicus brief opposing the Trump administration's bid to cancel humanitarian parole for half a million workers, the attorneys general for 15 states and Washington, D.C. noted that immigrants make up more than three quarters of home health aides in New York and nearly half in California. On Friday, the Supreme Court gave the Trump administration the green light to begin deporting about a half-million immigrants who entered the U.S. legally under humanitarian parole programs implemented during the Biden administration. The decision came less than two weeks after the justices granted another immigration-related emergency request from the administration, allowing officials to end temporary protected status for approximately 350,000 Venezuelans. Given already severe shortages of workers for typically low-paid and challenging care economy jobs, and a looming spike in demand for long-term care services as Baby Boomers age, the elder care industry is warning of an impending crisis. Rob Liebreich, the CEO of Goodwin Living, worries he may have to accept fewer residents and cut back services if his workers are deported. Reducing the supply of long-term care workers amid increasing demand will also drive up the cost of services as facilities compete for those who remain, he said. That, in turn, could force more aging Americans to depend on untrained family members as caregivers, which then pulls those people out of the paid workforce. 'It'll be a real drain on the overall economy,' he said. 'But more importantly, I just don't want to let down the current American older adult population, and we're absolutely going to let them down by not having enough hands to provide the services and support that they deserve and expect.' LeadingAge — an advocacy group representing thousands of nursing homes, assisted living facilities, hospice programs and retirement homes around the country — echoed Liebreich's fears in a letter to the Department of Homeland Security in April, pleading with the agency to reconsider ending the parole program. They did not receive a response. The Trump administration acknowledged some of these concerns in its March executive order canceling humanitarian parole for hundreds of thousands of immigrants, noting that there will be repercussions both for the individuals and their employers. Still, the order argued, both the immigrants and their employers knew that the protections were temporary and subject to the discretion of the federal government, and they should have applied for more permanent status. Liebreich said that while Goodwin has helped over 200 workers become citizens over the past decade and has set up the 65 currently at risk to meet with immigration attorneys, the Trump administration is closing off many of the other programs they would have been eligible for — like temporary protected status — and not giving them enough time to navigate the process. 'They thought they had two years to work with, not mere months,' he said. Saudatu Savage, a registered nurse at Goodwin Living who came as a refugee from Sierra Leone more than two decades ago and is now a U.S. citizen, said it will make her job much harder if dozens of her coworkers are forced to leave. 'It's going to be a disaster,' she said. 'There are not a lot of nurses out there, and there are going to be more and more patients. So it will be a burden on us and it's going to affect the whole health care system, and I fear the quality of care will be poor.' With the workers' status in limbo, even some staunch conservatives are warning of negative ramifications of the administration's crackdown, and are calling instead for an increase in visas for immigrants to work in health care. "You can't just do across-the-board reductions and not have real challenges in areas where vital workers exist, especially in health care,' said Tom Price, a former GOP congressman who served as the health secretary during Trump's first term and now works as a consultant. 'If you just have across-the-board reductions, it will harm our ability to continue to provide care for folks at all different levels, whether it's acute or chronic care." 'Measles doesn't care about your immigration status' When measles erupted among children in Minneapolis' large Somali community in May 2024, the city contracted with groups that work with the area's Somali, Hmong, Latin American and Native American populations, set up free vaccine clinics in their neighborhoods run by trusted community groups, deployed contact tracers, and produced videos in multiple languages urging vaccinations. A few months later, after identifying 52 cases and hospitalizing 12 people, they had it under control. But local officials fear that now, amid the biggest measles outbreak the U.S. has seen in decades, including a few cases in Minnesota, they may not be as successful. Health care providers in Minneapolis and around the country are reporting that since Trump took office and changed federal policy to allow immigration enforcement agents to detain people in hospitals and clinics, immigrants with and without documents are avoiding health services, including testing and treatment for infectious diseases and vaccinations. 'When people feel threatened, there's a chilling effect,' said Michelle Rivero, the director of the city's Office of Immigration and Refugee Affairs, which was founded during the first Trump administration. 'There is a greater sense of fear and anxiety with regard to accessing health care.' That chilling effect will be compounded, local officials warn, by the Trump administration's cuts to public health funding, which have forced the Minneapolis Public Health Department to shut down several vaccine clinics, lay off 170 staff members and end contracts with three community health organizations that were crucial in halting the 2024 measles outbreak: MHealth Fairview, Odam Medical Clinic, and Neighborhood HealthSource. The administration argued the funding should be cut because Congress had appropriated it to combat Covid-19 and the pandemic is over — though health departments around the country had been using the money to shore up defenses against other infectious diseases. Though a judge blocked the cuts from taking effect, that ruling could be overturned on appeal. At a time when immigrant groups' already high distrust of government is even higher due to fears of immigration enforcement, said Deputy Health Commissioner Heidi Ritchie, public health departments won't be successful if they can't contract with non-governmental community groups to do outreach and provide services. 'With the loss of those contracts, we can't be confident that we're able to serve a population when there's another measles outbreak,' she said. 'Measles doesn't care about your immigration status or your ethnicity. But when we are providing these clinics, they're free, and they are in community spaces that people already have trust with.' Under pressure from the Trump administration, several states including Minnesota and California are also rolling back programs that provide health insurance to undocumented immigrants, putting testing and treatment for infectious diseases further out of reach. In addition to measles, public health leaders are concerned about the impact of Trump's immigration policies on efforts to combat tuberculosis — a bacterial infection the U.S. nearly eradicated decades ago that is now resurging from Kansas City to Los Angeles. 'People are, all of a sudden, a little bit leery of presenting themselves in congregate settings where they might be targets for enforcement,' said Lori Tremmel Freeman, CEO of the National Association of County and City Health Officials. 'It really is emanating out of a greater fear of those places being actively monitored by ICE.' The Trump administration and advocacy groups that want to restrict immigration say higher levels of tuberculosis in immigrant communities justifies turning people away at the border. But Freeman and other experts stress that while the infections are more prevalent in those communities, it has nothing to do with their country of origin and everything to do with crowded living conditions and a lack of access to vaccines, which is why TB outbreaks are also common in U.S. homeless shelters and prisons. By implementing policies that deter immigrants from seeking health services, she argued, the Trump administration could make the situation worse. 'We are worried, from a public health standpoint, that people will tie tuberculosis outbreaks to immigrant communities unfairly and traumatize those groups even more,' Freeman said. 'We were fearful that it might be used by the administration to say, 'This is a disease they bring in. We've got to get them out of the country.'' To reach those fearful of coming in for services, some public health departments are ramping up telehealth services, while others are creating mobile units so that immigrants don't have to leave their neighborhoods. Still others are posting know-your-rights information in multiple languages for their patients, and coaching providers on what to do in the event of a raid. 'Our union has trained us on what to do if ICE comes into our hospitals,' said the California Nurses Association's Reding. 'We've always been patient advocates but right now the need for that is even stronger.' Yet both research and anecdotal reports suggest that the health care repercussions of restrictive immigration policies can extend beyond their target populations and linger long after the policies themselves are lifted. A 2021 study found that the 'public charge' rule in the first Trump administration — which penalized legal immigrants who used government safety net programs — led many low-income immigrants to avoid using health services, including more than a quarter of legal permanent residents, who were not subject to the rule. The chilling effect began years before the policy took effect, fueled by rhetoric from federal government officials, researchers found. Another study, published in 2022, found that legal immigrants without green cards were still avoiding care more than a year after President Joe Biden got rid of the rule. 'We've created fear and distrust of the health care system in the immigrant community even without enforcement,' said Arturo Vargas Bustamante, a professor at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health. 'This has big implications, including for mixed status households and U.S. citizen children, and it could be both costly and fatal.'
