In September the U.S. government announced an important proposal to change the financial requirements to become a permanent resident, i.e. get a green card. This change will define the “public charge of inadmissibility,” i.e. when the government can deny an application due to low income. The change is not in effect yet. DHS said it will soon publish a proposed rule that would make it much harder lower-income immigrants to become permanent residents or to even extend or change their status if already in the U.S.
There are important exceptions including refugees and asylees who do not have to show they are or will be self-sufficient, and green card holders applying for citizenship. In general, the government will look most closely at whether the immigrant himself received certain benefits in the 3 years before submitting the immigration application. But the government won’t look at benefits received before the rule goes into effect. Relevant benefits include Medicaid, the Medicare Part D Low Income Subsidy, SNAP (food stamps), public housing benefits, and more. Importantly, only benefits the immigrant receives for herself will be considered. There were rumors that benefits received by children including U.S. citizen children would be taken into account, but this appears not to be the case. Nonetheless there’s a lot of fear in immigrant communities causing them to withdraw their family members from health and other programs.
Currently, most green card applicants need an Affidavit of Support from a sponsor who agrees to take financial responsibility for the foreign national. This has traditionally been enough in most cases to get approval. But that’s no longer going to be enough. According to Vox’s Dara Lind, this could change the face of legal immigration to the U.S.: “Some family-based immigrants are more at risk than others — less than a quarter of recent Indian immigrants had incomes below the 250 percent threshold, while nearly two-thirds of recent Chinese immigrants and more than two-thirds of recent Mexican immigrants did. So the composition of legal immigration to the US could be in the balance.”
The announcement says “the proposed rule would apply to individuals seeking admission to the United States from abroad on immigrant or nonimmigrants visas, individuals seeking to adjust their status to that of lawful permanent residents from within the United States, and individuals within the United States who hold a temporary visa and seek to either extend their stay in the same nonimmigrant classification or to change their status to a different nonimmigrant classification.” For example, a person with Temporary Protected Status (TPS) is authorized to work. If that person marries a U.S. citizen and applies for permanent residence, s/he would probably be disqualified if she claimed SNAP benefits within 3 years of the application, after the rule goes into effect.
The details are complicated of course. You can read more at:
Questions and Answers posted by USCIS – short and relatively easy to understand
The Proposed Rule – all 447 pages!
Vox article on the proposal by Dara Lind
