Wilson Won’t Play Scrooge to Immigrants

SACRAMENTO —  Gov. Pete Wilson has a Christmas gift for strapped noncitizen families with children. That is, the immigrant families who were “playing by the rules” and living here legally last August when President Clinton signed the federal welfare reform bill. The governor has decided they should keep on receiving welfare checks and Medi-Cal health care.

Under the new act, the state could cut off their benefits.

That’s one big decision out of the way concerning immigrants, whom Wilson regularly gets accused of “bashing.” Others hang.

The governor is unsure whether to continue aid for the noncitizen aged, blind and disabled. That’s a big ticket item, and it’s still being haggled over in budget meetings.

Food stamps for legal immigrants, however, seem to be history, although nobody in Sacramento is quite ready to say so.

As for needy immigrant families who arrived here after Clinton’s bill-signing Aug. 22, well, they’ll just have to lean on their legal sponsors. Wilson wants to cut off their family aid.

“Enough’s enough,” the governor said in an interview. “Their sponsors are on the hook.”

If left to him, Wilson says, he’d track down the sponsors of all legal immigrants and make them honor the support papers they signed; get taxpayers off the hook. But those sponsorship pledges were unenforceable prior to welfare reform.

So “there is no recourse” regarding the pre-August immigrants, he says, except to dump them into the streets. “They’re probably as entitled [to welfare] as any people who have fallen on hard times,” he adds. They did immigrate here the “right way” rather than the “wrong way. They came legally.”

But the governor also is likely to wrap up a small gift for illegal immigrants. He’s leaning toward allowing them to keep participating in a federally funded program (WIC) that provides nutritious food for poor women and their children regardless of legal status. This is at least one instance, an aide notes, where the feds pay for a service to illegal immigrants after failing to stop them at the border.

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Clinton and Congress have given the states a wide berth to redesign their own welfare programs. The goal is to force welfare recipients into jobs and self-sufficiency, and to save federal dollars. It’s estimated that welfare funds flowing into California from Washington over the next six years will be cut by $6.8 billion, largely because federal benefits for legal immigrants are being slashed.

States can make up the difference, but that’s expensive, especially in California. In this state, there are roughly 375,000 noncitizen moms and kids on welfare, plus 330,000 legal immigrants receiving aid for the aged, blind and disabled.

Under the reform bill, the feds are playing Scrooge and inviting the states to join in.

Soon, there’ll be no more federal funding of food stamps or aged, blind and disabled benefits (SSI/SSP) for legal immigrants. Indeed, there’ll be no federal benefit money of any kind for immigrants who arrived after last August until they’ve been here at least five years. (Except for some, such as refugees.)

Moreover, states are invited to save money by eliminating the federal-state family aid (AFDC) and health care programs for pre-August immigrants. That’s where the governor is stepping in and saying forget it.

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Wilson is an old Marine with a leather hide, but he’s human. He doesn’t enjoy being called an “immigrant basher.” It also tarnishes the image, especially among Latinos. That’s presumably one reason for leaking these pro-immigrant decisions before they’re formally announced in his State of the State address and new budget proposal next month.

Wilson took pains while promoting Proposition 187 two years ago to distinguish between legal and illegal immigration. But that distinction became blurred in national debate and the governor unfairly became linked with Buchanan-style bashing.

“It was never our purpose to offend anybody,” he says heatedly, “but I will not apologize for one moment for insisting upon the enforcement of the law and [demanding that] Washington lift the burden from the people of California.”

Now, he thinks legal immigrants should quickly pursue citizenship. “I don’t understand why the hell people come here who do not intend to become citizens,” he says. “They could vote and enjoy the rights of citizenship.”

And qualify more easily for welfare under the new reform act.

As a practical matter, even if Wilson had wanted to scrap welfare for noncitizen families, the Democratic Legislature--led by Latinos in the Assembly--probably would have beaten him down. Still, the governor deserves his due. Whether motivated by politics or pragmatics or good policy, it’s the gift that counts.