Thread: Administration Ignoring Law Denying Visas To 'Likely' Welfare Recipients, Senator Say

By Craig Bannister
October 19, 2012
CNS News

The Obama administration is waiving a law that requires it to deny visas and entry to non-citizens who are “likely at any time to become” a government dependent – and is ignoring requests for information regarding this move, Sen. Jeff Sessions said today.

Sen. Sessions (R-AL), Ranking Member of the Senate Budget Committee, issued a statement after USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack missed the deadline to reply to oversight requests for data on expenditures for non-citizens on food stamps and information regarding the administration’s waiver of federal immigration law:

“Included in the oversight letter was a request for information about USDA’s contact with the Departments of State and Homeland Security regarding immigration law. Both DHS and DOS have effectively nullified the federal law that prohibits admission into the U.S. for those likely to become welfare reliant, further enabling USDA to surge non-citizen registration.”

“Such activities cannot be justified to the American people, which probably explains why the Administration has been unwilling to provide answers,” Sen. Sessions said.

According to section 212 of the Immigration and Nationality Act, which defines “Classes of aliens ineligible for visas or admission”:

“Any alien who, in the opinion of the consular officer at the time of application for a visa, or in the opinion of the Attorney General at the time of application for admission or adjustment of status, is likely at any time to become a public charge is inadmissible.”

Sen. Sessions and three other senators had previously sent a letter to Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and State Department Secretary Hillary Clinton – which was also ignored - asking why the federal immigration law was not being followed.

Commenting on Napolitano’s and Clinton’s refusal to respond, Sen. Sessions said:

“Our initial assessment of State Department data on ‘public charge’ denials further indicates that eligibility standards are being waived.”

“Given what we already know, and the otherwise inexplicable refusal for DHS to reply to such a simple inquiry, it necessarily suggests that the executive branch is trying to prevent the public from discovering its failure to follow U.S. immigration and welfare law.”

Editor's Note: The USDA has been asked to comment on its failure to reply to the senator's request, but has not yet done so.

Administration Ignoring Law Denying Visas To 'Likely' Welfare Recipients, Senator Says | CNSNews.com

Is Obama Buying the Election With His Welfare Explosion?


Published: Friday, 19 Oct 2012 | 3:36 PM ET

By: Larry Kudlow
CNBC Anchor

With the unprecedented budget explosion of means-tested, welfare-related entitlements, does Team Obama think it can buy the election?

It’s a cynical question. But I wouldn’t put it past that cynical bunch.Remember Harry Hopkins, Franklin Roosevelt’s close aid? It was Hopkins who argued tax and tax, spend and spend, elect and elect. Sound familiar? And if I’m not mistaken, the high-tax, anti-rich, big-spending, redistributionist FDR is one of President Barack Obama’s idols.

So let’s take a look at some of the recent budget-explosion data points:

According to Jeff Sessions, the ranking Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, means-tested welfare programs soared to over $1 trillion last year. The federal government accounted for $750 billion of that, while $250 billion came from the states, which leveraged federal payments into even larger expenses.
Between 2008 and 2011, federal welfare payments have jumped 32 percent. Food stamps have surged, with 71 percent more spending on the program in 2011 compared with 2008. Health payments, principally Medicaid, have climbed 37 percent.

By the way, it’s not just the deep recession and weak recovery that’s driving up these programs. It’s a substantial eligibility expansion, which started under George W. Bush, but has gone much further under President Obama. (Read More: Kudlow: Romney Trouncing Obama in 'This' Critical Area.)

In a larger budget context, reporter Jeffrey H. Anderson uses a Treasury Department study to chronicle the 7-Eleven presidency. In fiscal year 2012, ending Sept. 30, the government spent nearly $11 for every $7 of revenues taken in. The exact figures are $2.5 trillion in tax revenues and $3.5 trillion in spending. In other words, it spent 44 percent more than it had coming in. Previous fiscal years look even worse: The government spent 56 percent more than revenues in fiscal year 2011 and 60 percent more in fiscal year 2010.

All in all, according to Anderson, the government under the Obama administration received $6.8 trillion in taxes and spent $10.7 trillion — 56 percent more than it had available.What’s going on here is fiscal profligacy on the grandest scale in American history. And there are consequences.

Massive amounts of capital are being drained from the private sector and transferred to the government. This is one reason why American businesses have gone on a virtual capital-investment strike. Small businesses, in particular, can’t get the capital being drained by Uncle Sam. (Read More: Did Obama Really Cut Small Business Taxes 18 Times?)

After four years of trillion-dollar deficits, both businesses and individuals have held back investment because they fear massive tax increases are on the way. That’s a big reason why the so-called recovery has been so weak.

In addition, in our new entitlement nation, growing government dependency is ruining the very moral fiber and backbone of America’s traditional work ethic. Increasingly, the feds are paying more to not work, rather than providing after-tax incentives to go back to work.

Mitt Romney has taken a lot of flak for raising the issue of growing government dependency. But however inartfully he may have expressed his view, his basic story is correct. The sheer volume of spending going on in this country is bringing us ever closer to bankruptcy. (Read More: Romney on '47 Percent': I Was 'Completely Wrong'.)

And consider this: The spending explosion for means-tested welfare programs is outpacing spending on Social Security and Medicare, which are themselves veering toward bankruptcy.

I may be too cynical about Obama trying to buy the election with this entitlement explosion. Perhaps. But Obama wants to raise taxes in order to spend more on government unions and entitlement programs. It is redistribution, but it could be vote-buying, too.

—By CNBC's Larry Kudlow
​Is Obama Buying the Election With His Welfare Explosion? - The Kudlow Report - CNBC

Or it could be that Obama is following the Cloward Piven school of not letting a crisis go to waste.

Archived-Articles: Barack Obama and the Strategy of Manufactured Crisis