California created a welfare system for illegal – Latest News
California runs the nation’s largest welfare system, devoting more than $180 billion yearly to food, health care and different packages for the poor and downtrodden. To maintain the association, the state imposes the nation’s highest tax charges.
In idea, these packages are imagined to help struggling Californians. In actuality, many serve giant numbers of illegal immigrants. Today, California oversees a shadow welfare system that permits noncitizens to obtain health care, rental help, faculty grants, tax credit, low-cost car insurance coverage and even smartphones on the taxpayers’ dime.
We visited 4 public-services places of work in Southern California, every of which admitted that illegal aliens can enroll in public-welfare packages or obtain advantages on their youngsters’s behalf. In complete, California taxpayers spent not less than $11 billion subsidizing illegal immigrants within the final fiscal 12 months. The state’s shadow welfare system, it appears, reveals no indicators of slowing down.
Sign up for the California Morning Report publication
The largest information, opinion and tradition shaping California proper now.
Thanks for signing up!
Migrants flip themselves in to U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers after crossing the U.S.-Mexico border wall close to Jacumba Hot Springs, California, Sunday, Feb. 18, 2024. James Keivom
Local officers have been remarkably clear. In Glendale, we spoke to a welfare officer about California’s Cash Assistance Program for Immigrants (CAPI), a state-funded different to Supplemental Security Income (SSI) that gives month-to-month money help to low-income noncitizens who’re aged or disabled.
“If [you are] a citizen, you cannot get CAPI,” he stated. “I don’t care about legal or not. Not being [a] citizen [is the key].”
In LA, we heard more of the identical. We requested one other welfare officer about the advantages accessible to illegal immigrants and their youngsters. While some state packages are closed to illegals, we realized, they’re open to these aliens’ US-born youngsters.
“If you were born here and the child was born here, you get money for two,” the officer stated of CalWORKs, the state’s model of the federal Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program. “Because she is not and the child is, she only gets money for the child, and not for her.”
California Gov. Gavin Newsom speaks at a rally for democratic candidates Saturday, September 5, 2026, in Monroe, N.C. AP Photo/Nell Redmond
These advantages add up. In California, illegal immigrants can qualify for CAPI, public health insurance coverage and varied tax credit. Their youngsters qualify for others, together with CalWORKs and, as in different states, Section 8 rental subsidies. All informed, a household of 5 in California with two illegal-alien mother and father, two US-born youngsters and one illegal-alien grandparent can obtain public providers value more than $100,000 per 12 months.
State leaders are proud of it. In a latest podcast episode, Gov. Gavin Newsom bragged about his “controversial” choice to increase Medi-Cal protection to illegal immigrants. His spouse, Jennifer Siebel Newsom, inspired people to signal up for the California Earned Income Tax Credit, a program whose promotional supplies guarantee candidates that “no Social Security number” is “no problem.”
The governor’s workplace didn’t reply to our remark request by deadline.
How is all this attainable?
Federal law usually prohibits states from utilizing federal {dollars} to serve illegal aliens. To dodge these restrictions, California created parallel state- and regionally funded packages that allowed the state to increase advantages to illegal immigrants.
A basic view of Gate 36 of the U.S.-Mexico border wall is seen on Monday, Jan. 27, 2025, in El Paso, Texas. The deployment of 1,500 troops to Texas and California is a key element of President Donald Trump’s administration’s strategy to cut back illegal border crossings, block asylum as a pathway to U.S. entry and create a stark distinction with former President Joe Biden’s immigration enforcement insurance policies. NYPJ
Medicaid is a good instance. Federal law prohibits states from utilizing federal {dollars} to offer wraparound protection to illegal immigrants. So, California used a state-funding “bucket” within its Medi-Cal program to increase “full-scope” protection to illegal aliens. The expansions enrolled some 1.7 million people, costing the state an estimated $10 billion yearly — more than twice what the state legislative analyst initially projected.
California additionally makes use of a distinct legal class that allows sure migrants to qualify for state packages. The state deems sure aliens to be “permanently residing under color of law” — residing in California with the “knowledge and permission” of immigration enforcement — and permits them to make use of this designation to enroll in Medi-Cal, CAPI and different authorities packages. In apply, as a result of aged or disabled people are usually not deported, this implies aged international retirees can arrive in California and obtain in depth advantages.
Another manner that California shuffles money to illegal immigrants is thru these aliens’ youngsters. CalWORKs permits illegal-immigrant mother and father to obtain advantages on behalf of their US-born children. AdvantagesCal, the state’s welfare clearinghouse, even tells candidates that this system will settle for a “statement” that the applicant “intend[s] to file or [is] taking steps to become federally eligible” to qualify for this system.
Migrants wait to give up to U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers at a makeshift migrant camp after they crossed the U.S.-Mexico border, Thursday, Feb. 22, 2024, in Boulevard, California. James Keivom
This model — permissive guidelines and enormous loopholes — prices the state billions per 12 months. As advantages and eligibility proceed to develop, that determine will solely increase within the years forward. California reveals no signal of paring back this largesse.
In 2022, Newsom signed a invoice into law that prolonged taxpayer-funded food advantages to illegal low-income residents. Beginning subsequent October, certified Californians 55 and older will grow to be eligible for that program, regardless of immigration standing. California’s Legislative Analyst estimates that it might price up to an extra $400 million a 12 months.
The state additionally has no citizenship necessities for varied packages. California’s state-sponsored Low Cost Auto Insurance Program tells illegal-immigrant drivers that they might qualify for sponsored protection “regardless of immigration status.”
In 2025, Newsom signed laws banning California LifeLine — a program that gives free telephones and cell service — from requiring candidates to provide a Social Security quantity.
As we walked round a number of LA welfare places of work, we noticed cellphone suppliers pitching California LifeLine plans. When we approached one supplier, a consultant informed us that candidates can use a Mexican consular identification card to enroll. The program’s web site confirms as a lot.
A modified utility truck utilized by smugglers to pack 31 illegal aliens like cargo and haul them by means of harmful desert heat is proven close to Ocotillo, California. X/@USBPChiefELC
Between health insurance coverage, money transfers and different packages, California’s shadow welfare system doles out beneficiant advantages to illegal immigrants at taxpayers’ expense. Ordinary Californians, meantime, are depleting their financial savings, working long hours and taking up tons of debt merely to pay the payments.
Under Gavin Newsom’s social contract, working Americans should not solely deal with rising taxes and ballooning residing prices but additionally bear the burden of financing advantages for illegal immigrants and their households.
In different states, citizenship establishes who qualifies for taxpayer-funded advantages. In California, citizenship merely determines who pays.
Christopher F. Rufo is a senior fellow on the Manhattan Institute, a contributing editor of City Journal and the creator of America’s Cultural Revolution. Kenneth Schrupp is an investigative reporter at City Journal. Austen Hufford is a senior investigative reporter at City Journal.
Download The California Post App, comply with us on social, and subscribe to our newsletters
California Post News: Facebook, Instagram, TikTookay, X, YouTube, WhatsApp, LinkedIn
California Post Sports Facebook, Instagram, TikTookay, YouTube, X
California Post Opinion
California Post Newsletters: Sign up right here!
California Post App: Download right here!
Home supply: Sign up right here!
Page Six Hollywood: Sign up right here!
