The Immigration Control and Financial Responsibility Act, which was abruptly removed from the Senate floor earlier this month, was brought back again late last week.
It returned even though it continues to face some of the same challenges which caused it to be pulled earlier — including a Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimate that the bill would impose unfunded federal mandates on local and state governments in excess of $200 million and an amendment to increase the minimum wage from $4.25 to $5.15 an hour.
This $200 million unfunded mandate figure refers to provisions in the bill that would require national standards for birth certificates and drivers licenses, with the bulk of the cost attributed to the requirements for drivers licenses.
Because the unfunded mandate threshold was breached, NACo and the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL) raised the possibility of a point of order with several senators. As a result, some of the bill’s provisions are being redrafted to put in a 10-year implementation period for these requirements. However, NACo remains opposed to these provisions and is working with Senator Mike DeWine (R-Ohio) on an amendment to strike the section.
The bill also includes provisions that would like a sponsor’s income to the legal immigrant for eligibility purposes in all means-tested federal programs. Known as “deeming,” this requirement is only used in Aid to Families with Dependent Children, Food Stamps, and Supplemental Security Income.
The CBO said the provision and the programs involved were too complex to quantify in the short time it was given, but that the administrative costs could exceed the unfunded mandates threshold. Among the programs that could be affected are Medicaid, Foster Care, School Lunch and Child Nutrition, nutrition programs for the elderly, child care, and job training.
NCSL did an analysis of 10 of the 50 programs, not including Medicaid, that could be affected, and came up with a state and local government cost estimate of $744 million.
Deeming would affect every county agency that operates a federal means-tested program, regardless of the size of its immigrant population, and would require extensive staff training and infrastructure costs, citizenship determination for all applicants, and sponsorship verification through the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) System of Alien Verification of Eligibility (SAVE) secondary verification. The INS system will only give information on who is the sponsor.
It would be up to the county agency to train its personnel in the complexities of immigration status and income deeming requirements. The INS secondary verification system now takes about three and a half weeks to complete verification requests. This lag time is likely to increase considerably with the addition of all means-tested programs.
Furthermore, since there is no comprehensive system to unify data on all means-tested programs, those who apply for more than one program could undergo the verification process multiple times. County agencies responsible for larger programs such as Medicaid and Foster Care may have to add a new computer infrastructure. Since some federally-funded programs do not mandate that states assess eligibility, one would need to be created, which would mean hiring and training new staff.
NACo, NCSL, and the National League of Cities have alerted the Senate to these costs, and are working with Senator Bob Graham (D-Fla.) and others on amendments to reduce the scope and administrative burden of these provisions.