Posted on 04/04/2013 6:11:36 PM PDT by haffast
Senate Republican staffers estimated Thursday that the annual cost to taxpayers of legalizing illegal immigrants could be in the billions, if they use their status to apply for federal benefits from Medicaid and ObamaCare. The claim, though, was challenged by Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, a key Republican engaged in immigration bill talks.
Republicans on the Senate Budget Committee -- responding to an emerging immigration proposal that includes a path to citizenship for millions of illegal immigrants -- had estimated that the cost could total up to $40 billion in 2022, "just for Medicaid and ObamaCare."
"The net costs would be enormous and only increase once citizenship is granted," the office of Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions, top Republican on the committee, said in a statement Thursday. The estimates were crunched by budget committee Republican staff.
Payments from Medicaid and subsidies from the federal health care law represent just a fraction of federal government benefits that a green-card holder or U.S. citizen can apply for.
But Rubio spokesman Alex Conant disputed the numbers, saying in a statement late Thursday that it's simply too early to provide cost estimates.
"Since we don't yet have a legislative proposal, it's not possible to come up with anything resembling an accurate calculation about the potential fiscal impact of bipartisan immigration reform," he said.
snip
"Senator Rubio has been clear that he will only support legislation that prohibits undocumented immigrants from receiving any federal benefits, and in our negotiations, the Democrats have gone along with that demand -- even agreeing to a partial repeal of ObamaCare to bar undocumented immigrants benefits. In the long-term, there's no question that modernizing our broken legal immigration will be very good for our nation's economy," he said.
snip
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
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Rubio needs to be educated on this.
...and within a year the rats will change the law allowing undocumented democrats all benefits
"According to a report - released today by the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office - the Reagan tax cuts will cost the American economy $500,000 trillion dollars, result in a civilian unemployment rate of 2500%, and push the price of a gallon of milk over $3,000,000 for the first time in recent memory."
Every hospital in this city takes care of anyone who walks or crawls in off the street whether you have insurance or not.
Do you think that Boehner actually wants the real numbers (or even a number off my 90%) to be made public?
R’s will settle for an EO guarantee not to give criminaliens zero-care benefits... said EO to fade some late Friday before a holiday.
quote “Senator Rubio has been clear that he will only support legislation that prohibits undocumented immigrants from receiving any federal benefits”Senator Rubio has been clear that he will only support legislation that prohibits undocumented immigrants from receiving any federal benefits
um... once you grant them citizenship... they wont be “undocumented immigrants” any more ! They will be citizens with just as much rights to those benefits as every other citizen.
Far far worse is the cost to society of saying that laws only matter for some people and not for others.
You mean that the real numbers won't be as bad as we think? I'm confused.
Rubio should go away and shut up!!!
I wouldn’t vote for him for garbage collector!
The republicans needs to use this for ridicule,,”Geee, you know, if it wasn’t for the Obamacare factor,,there might be something to go with here”..OOOPs!
I reread my post and it didn't make much sense. I was trying to say that I think the real numbers are so bad that if they lowballed it by 90% it would still freak people out. Therefore no numbers are given.
Granting citizenship to the criminals who cross our National Border IS amnesty,
_______
May 5, 2013 Poster idea:
“AMNESTY NO !
HOSTILITY YE$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ !”
We can call their bluff by demanding that the amnesty be limited to the 11 million they claim there are.
Their certain refusal will prove that they know that there are far more, like 20-30 million, illegals. They just don’t want the American people to know the real number.
Are there still people on FR who think that Rubio is a viable presidential candidate?
Rubio and Rand, two peas in the pod, lying about Amnesty.
Exactly, what ever happened to Sovereignty? No Sovereignty, No Peace!
If this is an example of Rubio’s forward looking as to problems and awareness he goes down a few rungs on my ladder of an administrator.
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