Ark. Legislature looks at illegal immigration bill

Feb 21, 2011 3:00am

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — An Arkansas lawmaker pushing to prohibit the state from providing non-emergency benefits to illegal immigrants doesn't deny the chief argument against his proposal: that it would cut off services for children and pre-natal care the state provides.

Rep. Jon Hubbard, who is expected to present his measure to a House panel this week, said he doesn't like that the legislation he's backing would affect those services. But the freshman Republican lawmaker from Jonesboro said that's the only way to stop the flow of illegal immigrants.

"I'm not an ogre," Hubbard said last week. "I'm not trying to be somebody that's hard on the kids. The kids are an innocent victim of this, just like the citizens of this state are innocent."

Hubbard's proposal, which is expected to go before the House State Agencies and Governmental Affairs Committee on Wednesday, would bar the state agencies from providing benefits to anyone in the country illegally. The proposal would not apply to cases involving emergency or life-saving measures.

The problem, Gov. Mike Beebe and other state officials say, is it would go too far by denying other essential services to some of the most vulnerable in the state.

"You're talking about taking health care away from unborn children, you're talking about taking health care away from disabled children, you're talking about taking mammograms away from women to detect breast cancer," Beebe spokesman Matt DeCample said. "And that's all pretty dangerous stuff. ... By just his conscience, the governor cannot support any bill that deprives unborn children of health care or deprives developmentally disabled children from the help they need."

Opponents of the measure say that many of the restrictions on benefits are already covered by state and federal law, but state agencies say the range of other non-emergency services affected could be large.

John Selig, director of the Department of Human Services, said a major concern is that the proposal would cut off funding for prenatal care for women who are in the country illegally. The care is provided by the state to women earning up to 200 percent of the poverty level who are either undocumented or who are documented citizens but have not been in the country legally long enough to qualify for a similar Medicaid program.

Selig said the care helps avoid future medical costs and also helps hospitals avoid the cost of uncompensated care.

"Our concern is they are going to be American citizens and Arkansas citizens," Selig said, referring to the unborn children.

A DHS spokeswoman said other programs that could be affected by the legislation include child welfare and protection and some services for developmentally disabled children.

Hubbard said he understands that they will be affected, but described it as a necessary step to stop illegal immigration.

"The prenatal care part to me is like the magnet that draws the parents here in the first place," Hubbard said.

Another part of the bill that has drawn opposition is a provision that Hubbard said he plans to remove that would have required state agencies to have anyone receiving public benefits to sign an affidavit that they're in the country legally. Hubbard said he plans on removing that provision, which would have required agencies to provide notary public services at no cost to the applicant.

Selig said that would have required his agency to spend at least $20 million to comply with that section and hire hundreds more employees.

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