Thread: Revised SCHIP still has loophole allowing IAs benefits

Revised SCHIP still has loophole allowing illegal aliens to receive benefits
From this:

The revised children's health insurance bill that Congress is about to send to President Bush still has loopholes that both illegal aliens and ineligible legal immigrants could exploit to join the program, a new Heritage Foundation analysis shows.

Under the bill, those applying for the State Children's Health Insurance Program would not have to prove citizenship. Instead, they only would have to provide a valid Social Security number — something most legal immigrants and many illegal aliens already have, said Robert Rector, a senior research fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation, whose analysis is being released today...
http://lonewacko.com/blog/archives/007289.html

This is ONE of the many reasons why the SSA must communicate with DHS. What will Medicaid do when it gets applications using the same SS number hundreds of times?

So much money spent on combatting Medicare/Medicaid fraud and they would let this slide by?

Heritage Foundation: SCHIP would increase illegals’ access to Medicaid

2007-12-05


WASHINGTON -
The Children’s Health Insurance Program Reauthorization Act of 2007 (HR 3963), passed in the Senate and the House, significantly changes the law with respect to both legal and illegal immigrants. It affects not only the children’s health program (SCHIP) but also the far larger general Medicaid program.

Specifically, the SCHIP reauthorization bill:

» Weakens evidentiary and document standards governing entry into Medicaid, making it easier for illegal immigrants to fraudulently obtain benefits.

» Overturns limitations on immigrant use of Medicaid enacted in the 1996 welfare reform law by gutting procedures used to determine immigrant eligibility — and thus readily permitting immigrants to receive benefits for which they remain legally ineligible.

HR 3963 fails to adequately prevent abuse of taxpayer funds. It increases opportunities for illegal immigrants to obtain Medicaid benefits and for legal immigrants to enroll in SCHIP or Medicaid before living in the United States the requisite five years. As such, the legislation is a significant step backward in efforts to prevent welfare fraud.

www.examiner.com