President Donald Trump signed a memo Tuesday directing his administration to ensure that illegal aliens are not receiving taxpayer funds from Social Security Act programs, including Old-Age and Survivors Insurance, unemployment insurance, disability insurance, Medicare, Medicaid, and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families.
The initiative appears to be aimed both at eliminating the monetary incentive for foreign nationals to steal into the homeland and at pressuring the noncitizen net-takers already here to either wean off the dole or hit the road.
The memo directs the Social Security Administration to: expand its fraud prosecutor programs to at least 50 U.S. attorney offices; establish a Medicare and Medicaid fraud prosecution program in 15 U.S. attorney offices; investigate earning reports of individuals supposedly 100 years or older with mismatched records; consider reinstating its civil monetary penalty program; and reinforce program integrity measures so only those foreign nationals who satisfy all eligibility requirements can receive benefits.
‘This literally blew us away.’
In a fact sheet detailing the memo, the White House echoed Elon Musk’s recent revelation that over two million illegal aliens were apparently assigned Social Security numbers in fiscal year 2024 alone.
Venture capitalist Antonio Gracias, who has been working with the Department of Government Efficiency in scrutinizing the SSA, noted at the Wisconsin town hall where Musk highlighted the provision of Social Security numbers to illegal aliens, “This literally blew us away,” reported NewsNation.
“We went there to find fraud, and we found this by accident,” said Gracias.
Migrants authorized to legally work in the U.S. are eligible to apply for a Social Security Card — but in order to receive Supplemental Security Income, the Department of Homeland Security must class them as a migrant legally admitted and conferred permanent residency, a migrant granted conditional entry or asylum, or a migrant paroled into the country or admitted as a refugee.
Gracias suggested that in recent years, migrants were given SSNs automatically through the mail without an interview or showing identification.
The White House fact sheet notes that the multitudes of illegal aliens who entered the U.S. under the Biden administration are “siphoning dollars and essential services from American citizens while state and local budgets grow increasingly strained.”
The Center for Immigration Studies revealed in a December 2023 report that 54% of households headed by immigrants, including naturalized citizens, legal residents, and illegal aliens, used one or more major welfare program.
‘These taxpayer-funded benefits should be only for eligible taxpayers.’
The study indicated that 48% of “illegal-headed households” used food welfare programs; 39% relied on Medicaid; 18% relied on cash welfare; and 4% relied on housing programs.
The House Committee on Homeland Security noted in a November 2023 report that the cost in federal welfare for every one million parolees released into the U.S. under the Biden administration was likely in the neighborhood of $3 billion annually.
As of 2022, American taxpayers were shelling out at least $182 billion annually to provide services and benefits to illegal aliens and their dependents, according to the Federation for American Immigration Reform report cited in the White House’s fact sheet. FAIR indicated that net cost is $150.7 billion if the estimated $31 billion taxes illegal aliens cough up are factored.
The White House noted that the $182 billion figure includes $66.4 billion in federal expenses and $115.6 billion in state and local expenses. Again citing FAIR estimates, the White House noted that “a million illegal aliens hold stolen identifications or fraudulent SSNs” — abuse that has long been widespread.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters Tuesday, “These taxpayer-funded benefits should be only for eligible taxpayers.”
“President Biden should think about what he did in his last term, which is allow tens of millions of illegal people into our country, many of whom were fraudulently receiving these benefits.”
The Social Security Administration indicated that Trump’s memorandum “reinforces SSA’s commitment to safeguarding taxpayer dollars and ensuring the integrity of the programs it administers.”
“The Social Security Administration is dedicated to protecting the vital benefits that American workers have earned on behalf of themselves and their families,” said acting SSA Commissioner Leland Dudek. “We are committed to working diligently to implement the President’s memorandum and to ensure that benefits are paid only to those who should receive them.”
Martin O’Malley, the SSA commissioner during Joe Biden’s final year in office, told Government Executive, “This is all on brand for them, because they enjoy inflicting cruelty on people in the name of going after immigrants.”
“If they go forward with this representative payee plan, they are talking about interrupting benefits that are legally owed to Americans and American-born children here in the U.S.,” said O’Malley. “Just because someone might not have proof of their legal status on an SSA record doesn’t mean they aren’t the representative payee for a U.S. citizen, whether it be their husband with a disability, a mother-in-law, an American-born child.”
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