Food Stamps (SNAP) Systematically Favors Mixed Illegal Immigrant-Citizen Families Over Those With Only American Citizens
Despite President Trump’s crackdown on illegal immigration into the US, many American citizens are still being unfairly discriminated against by the government’s welfare apparatus, in favor of illegal aliens.
Specifically, the Trump administration has yet to correct a longstanding loophole in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), commonly known as food stamps. The loophole ensures that families with an illegal immigrant parent are more likely to qualify for food stamps than families with two American citizens—clear-cut discrimination against American citizens.
How does the SNAP loophole work?
To begin with, illegal aliens are not technically allowed to collect food stamps, or other government benefits—of course, they still do. In fact, the State of California spends some $30 billion on its illegal alien population. But this is besides the point.
When it comes to SNAP, illegal aliens cannot (officially) collect.
However, if the family is of mixed legal status, for example if one parent is a citizen while the other is an alien, this family will still receive some benefits. Individual states have some authority over how benefits are meted out, and most have hoped in favor of a system that records all of the income of a citizen, but only includes a portion of the alien’s income.
This means that the gross income used in calculating SNAP benefits will be lower for families of mixed legal status (because the income of the illegal alien is grossed down). This means that when comparing two families, one with two citizens and one of mixed legal statuses, the mixed family will more easily qualify for aid—despite the fact that both families may earn the same income.
Here’s an example of this system in action, according to the Center for Immigration Studies:
Let’s look at the system as applied to two similar families who live in adjacent houses; both have incomes of $2,400 a month, both have the same assets, both families consist of a working male, his stay-at-home spouse, and their stay-at-home toddler. The only difference is that one of the men is a native-born citizen and the other is an illegal alien. Everyone else in the two households is a citizen.
OK, so far. Now let’s walk through Alice’s special mirror, and see how the government handles the situation. It sees the three-citizen family as three people and says that $2,400 a month is too high an income for food stamps. It looks at the other family and sees it as a two-member family, because the man is an illegal, and then — here’s the key — the government decides that only two-thirds of the family income should be counted, and that $1,600 is not too high for a family of two, hence the family with the illegal alien in it gets food stamps and the other family does not.
