Shocking Rules For Immigrants

A shocking decision for immigrants has finalized by Supreme Court on Monday by accepting the Trump administration to implement new rules that could imperil permanent resident status for immigrants who are using food stamps, Medicaid and housing vouchers. Under the new policy, immigration officers can decline green cards to legal immigrants over their use of public benefits.

Stephen Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor, are the court's four liberal justices, who voted to prevent the policy from taking effect. The lawsuits will continue to the immigrants, but they applying for permanent residency should now show that they wouldn't be public charges, or burdens to the country.

If it is known that immigrants may potentially become public charges later, then legal residency could be rejected. Under the old rules, people who used non-cash benefits, along food stamps and Medicaid, were not considered public charges.

An immigration expert at Cornell University's law school, Stephen Yale-Loehr said, “The public charge rule is the latest attack in the Trump administration’s war on immigrants, this makes it harder for working class people to immigrate or to stay in US. This rule is another brick in the invisible wall this administration is building to curb legal immigration."

Annually around 544,000 people apply for green cards. As per the government, 382,000 are in categories that would make them subject to the new review. They make up a small portion of those getting the public benefits, as many are not qualified to receive them because of their immigration status.