Trump administration hands over Medicaid recipients’ personal data, including addresses, to ICE

WASHINGTON AP Immigration and Customs Enforcement authorities will be given access to the personal records of the nation s million Medicaid enrollees including home addresses and ethnicities to track down immigrants who may not be living legally in the United States according to an agreement obtained by The Associated Press The information will give ICE representatives the ability to find the location of aliens across the country says the agreement signed Monday between the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and the Department of Homeland Safety The agreement has not been reported publicly The extraordinary disclosure of millions of such personal wellness material to deportation representatives is the latest escalation in the Trump administration s immigration crackdown which has repeatedly tested legal boundaries in its effort to arrest people daily Lawmakers and certain CMS agents have challenged the legality of deportation authorities access to several states Medicaid enrollee figures It s a move first broadcasted by the AP last month that Healthcare and Human Services administrators stated was aimed at rooting out people enrolled in the undertaking improperly But the latest data-sharing agreement makes clear what ICE officers intend to do with the strength evidence ICE will use the CMS content to allow ICE to receive identity and location information on aliens identified by ICE the agreement says Such an action could ripple widely Such disclosures even if not acted upon could cause widespread alarm among people seeking urgency biological help for themselves or their children Other efforts to crack down on illegal immigration have made schools churches courthouses and other everyday places feel perilous to immigrants and even U S citizens who fear getting caught up in a raid HHS spokesman Andrew Nixon would not respond to the latest agreement It is unclear though whether Homeland Safety has yet accessed the information The department s assistant secretary Tricia McLaughlin disclosed in an emailed comment that the two agencies are exploring an initiative to ensure that illegal aliens are not receiving Medicaid benefits that are meant for law-abiding Americans The database will reveal to ICE officers the names addresses birth dates ethnic and racial information as well as Social Protection numbers for all people enrolled in Medicaid The state and federally funded operation provides healthcare care coverage effort for the poorest of people including millions of children The agreement does not allow ICE functionaries to download the facts Instead they will be allowed to access it for a limited period from a m to p m Monday through Friday until Sept They are trying to turn us into immigration agents explained a CMS official did not have permission to speak to the media and insisted on anonymity Immigrants who are not living in the U S legally as well as several lawfully present immigrants are not allowed to enroll in the Medicaid undertaking that provides nearly-free coverage for healthcare services Medicaid is a jointly funded scheme between states and the federal executive But federal law requires all states to offer crisis Medicaid a temporary coverage that pays only for lifesaving services in urgency rooms to anyone including non-U S citizens Crisis Medicaid is often used by immigrants including those who are lawfully present and those who are not Several people sign up for urgency Medicaid in their the bulk desperate moments reported Hannah Katch a previous adviser at CMS during the Biden administration It s unthinkable that CMS would violate the trust of Medicaid enrollees in this way Katch declared She commented the personally identifiable information of enrollees has not been historically shared outside of the agency unless for law enforcement purposes to investigate waste fraud or abuse of the scheme Trump group has pursued information aggressively Trump representatives last month demanded that the federal physical condition agency s staffers release personally identifiable information on millions of Medicaid enrollees from seven states that permit non-U S citizens to enroll in their full Medicaid programs The states launched these programs during the Biden administration and declared they would not bill the federal regime to cover the robustness care costs of those immigrants All the states California New York Washington Oregon Illinois Minnesota and Colorado have Democratic governors That content sharing with DHS personnel prompted widespread backlash from lawmakers and governors Twenty states have since sued over the move alleging it violated federal wellness privacy laws CMS leaders previously fought and failed to stop the content sharing that is now at the center of the lawsuits On Monday CMS functionaries were once again debating whether they should provide DHS access citing concerns about the ongoing litigation In an email chain obtained by the AP called Hold DHS Access URGENT CMS chief legal officer Rujul H Desai announced they should first ask the Department of Justice to appeal to the White House directly for a pause on the information sharing In a response the next day HHS lawyer Lena Amanti Yueh stated that the Justice Department was settled with CMS proceeding with providing DHS access Dozens of members of Congress including Democratic Sen Adam Schiff of California sent letters last month to DHS and HHS representatives demanding that the information-sharing stop The massive transfer of the personal figures of millions of Medicaid recipients should alarm every American This massive violation of our privacy laws must be halted forthwith Schiff explained in response to AP s description of the new expanded agreement It will harm families across the nation and only cause more citizens to forego lifesaving access to soundness care The new agreement makes clear that DHS will use the information to identify for deportation purposes people who in the country illegally But HHS agents have repeatedly maintained that it would be used primarily as a cost-saving measure to investigate whether non-U S citizens were improperly accessing Medicaid benefits HHS acted entirely within its legal authority and in full compliance with all applicable laws to ensure that Medicaid benefits are reserved for individuals who are lawfully entitled to receive them Nixon announced in a comment responding to the lawsuits last month