A Missouri House committee is considering a bill that would block public assistance to immigrants who cannot verify whether they’re in the United States legally. Current law allows someone to be eligible for state and local benefits for up to 90 days while they try to obtain proper documentation.
That provision would be eliminated under a bill sponsored by GOP House Member Wanda Brown of Benton County.
“That is just bad policy. There’s nothing from stopping you from, in 90 days, going to the next county and saying, ‘I don’t have any ID right now, I can’t come up with it,’” Brown said.
Opponents say most non-citizens are already ineligible for public benefits. Vanessa Crawford Aragon with the group Missouri Immigrant and Refugee Advocates spoke against the bill during a hearing Thursday. She said it could result in people who are legally in the U.S. to lose public benefits.
“I don’t think that we’re talking about hundreds and hundreds of people, but I do think that there are going to be families for whom this is an issue, families that currently are being turned away because their situation is complicated,” Aragon said.
The House Committee on Downsizing Government has taken no action on the measure yet.