Photo Credit: fredcaminoBy The Heritage Foundation. Granting amnesty to an estimated 11 million unlawful immigrants will cost taxpayers at least $6.3 trillion, according to a new report by Heritage Foundation scholar Robert Rector. The highly anticipated report, released today, becomes available as a Senate committee is set to mark up a “comprehensive immigration reform” bill May 9.
“No matter how you slice it, amnesty will add a tremendous amount of pressure on America’s already strained public purse,” said Rector, Heritage’s senior research fellow in domestic policy studies.
The vast majority of the fiscal costs examined are long-term – including costs associated with Obamacare, Social Security and other entitlements, plus more than 80 means-tested welfare programs. Among the major findings of Rector and co-author Jason Richwine:
·Over the course of their lives, former unlawful immigrants together would receive $9.4 trillion in government benefits and services and pay $3.1 trillion in taxes, for a lifetime “fiscal deficit” – at minimum — of $6.3 trillion (total benefits minus total taxes).
·The typical unlawful immigrant is 34 years old, has a 10th-grade education, and already receives $14,387 per household in government benefits in excess of taxes paid. After the bill’s “interim” period of about 13 years, when former unlawful immigrants become eligible for welfare and Obamacare subsidies, that “fiscal deficit” would double to $29,500 per household.
·After amnesty, the typical unlawful immigrant will receive government benefits for 50 years, meaning his household would receive $592,000 more in government benefits during his lifetime than he would pay in taxes. At retirement, he would draw more than $3 in Social Security and Medicare for every dollar he paid in FICA taxes. Read more from this story HERE.
Rep. King: Immigration Reform Is ‘Breathtaking, Outrageous Form of Amnesty’
By Paul Scicchitano and Kathleen Walter. Rep. Steve King of Iowa tells Newsmax TV that the immigration reform bill that has emerged in the Senate is nothing more than a euphemism for the “most breathtaking, outrageous form of amnesty” for some 11 million illegal immigrants now in the U.S.
“The people that are for open borders — the people that are for granting amnesty — seem to be stuck on the idea that they can’t pass their amnesty if it’s called amnesty,” King said in an exclusive interview on Monday. “And so they try to redefine the word ‘amnesty,’ and they call it ‘comprehensive immigration reform.’”
The battle over immigration reform that is all but certain to take place in the House factored into King’s announcement last week that he will not run for the Senate.
“I didn’t want to arrive in the United States Senate in January of 2015 looking at a mess that had been created in the previous 20 or so months, and then not be in a position to undo — not be in a position to fix this immigration legislation that’s coming at us,” said King. “If that is written into law — and the president could sign something that looks anything like the 844 pages in the Senate — that’s a genie that you can’t put back in the bottle.”
A member of the House Agriculture and Judiciary committees, King said that the urgency of the fight “outrode” his opportunity to gain a stronger voice in the Senate. Read more from this story HERE.