Immigrants who are in the country illegally will no longer be allowed to access the Head Start early childhood education program for their children, as well as other federal programs, the Trump administration said Thursday.
The departments of Health and Human Services, Agriculture, and Labor said they have issued notice to the relevant program partners under their watch to clarify the administration's interpretation of what falls under "federal public benefit," The Wall Street Journal reports.
According to the HHS guidelines, people in the United States illegally will be barred not only from sending their children to Head Start but will also be denied access to other programs, including assistance for the homeless, Title X family planning, mental health services, and substance abuse treatment.
While discussing the issue, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said he is rescinding an interpretation of the 1996 Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act, which "improperly extended certain federal public benefits to illegal aliens."
While immigrants who don't have legal status do not qualify for most federal benefits, many of the programs affected have not been asking their participants about their immigration status, but qualify them through income and other verification methods.
The new policy is set to take effect immediately, an HHS spokesperson said.
Meanwhile, the Department of Agriculture, pointing to guidance issued in April that sought to prohibit immigrants who are in the United States illegally from using food stamps, affirmed its position that they "should not receive government dollars."
Shortly after taking office, President Donald Trump directed agencies to identify relevant programs and issued an executive order to prevent immigrants in the U.S. without legal permission from getting benefits funded by taxpayers.
In negotiations over the Trump-sponsored megabill signed into law on July 4, the White House promised that the president would issue more executive actions aimed at illegal immigration.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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