The ruling allows the Trump administration to share the names, addresses and phone numbers of undocumented immigrants who receive Medicaid benefits with federal immigration authorities.
ICE will have access to Medicaid enrollees’ personal data
The Trump administration is giving ICE a new way to identify people who are in the U.S. illegally by accessing data on people enrolled in Medicaid.
Fox – 4 News
A federal judge ruled on Dec. 29 that the Trump administration can resume sharing the location and other information of some Medicaid patients with immigration authorities, handing a victory to the White House’s aggressive deportation efforts.
U.S. District Judge Vince Chabria of California said in his ruling that the federal government can legally share “basic biographical, location, and contact information” under the law. The ruling will take effect on January 6, according to court documents.
The move comes months after 20 states, including California, filed a lawsuit in July seeking to prevent the federal government from sharing data on illegal immigrants obtained by the Department of Health and Human Services with Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
“We are disappointed in the court’s decision to allow some Medicaid data to be shared with ICE,” the office of California Attorney General Rob Bonta, one of about 20 Democratic officials who filed a lawsuit seeking to block the information-sharing effort, said in a statement.
Chhabria noted in his ruling that while basic Medicaid information can be shared with ICE, the injunction also applies to information beyond that, such as data about immigrants legally in the country.
“Aside from the basic information discussed above, the policy is entirely unclear and does not appear to be the product of a coherent decision-making process,” he wrote.
Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement that the ruling is “a victory for the rule of law and for American taxpayers.”
Undocumented immigrants are in most cases ineligible for federal health benefits and are not covered by comprehensive Medicaid.
However, some undocumented immigrants can receive life-saving treatment in emergency rooms through Emergency Medicaid, and some states, including California, allow them to receive other state-subsidized benefits regardless of their immigration status.
The Trump administration is requiring federal agencies to share information with immigration authorities to further the president’s deportation plan. Judges have blocked some of those efforts.
In September, a federal judge in California temporarily blocked the U.S. Department of Agriculture from collecting data on recipients of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, commonly known as SNAP. In November, a federal judge in Washington, D.C., blocked the IRS from sharing tax return information with ICE.
Chhabria has not issued a final ruling in the Medicaid information case. A hearing is scheduled for Friday, Jan. 2, according to court records.
