Trump Administration Unveils Wealth Test For Green Cards, Resolving Long-Standing Concern That The Poor Could Still Become Americans

WASHINGTON. The Department of Homeland Security on Monday finalized a sweeping new rule allowing the federal government to deny green cards and visas to immigrants deemed likely to one day use public benefits, resolving a long-standing concern that a person could become an American without first demonstrating they would never need the country's help.

Under the regulation, officials evaluating an application will weigh whether the applicant has at any point used, or might in the future use, programs such as Medicaid, food stamps, or housing assistance, benefits that Congress has made available to qualifying residents. The rule also instructs adjudicators to consider an applicant's income, age, health, family size, education, English proficiency, and credit score, assembling what amounts to a totality-of-circumstances examination of whether the newcomer is the right kind of poor, or, ideally, not poor at all. Applicants earning well above the federal poverty line are to be viewed favorably, a standard that resolves the historic difficulty of telling in advance which immigrants would have been wealthy if only they had started out that way.

The acting director of Citizenship and Immigration Services, Ken Cuccinelli, defended the policy in a radio interview, where he was asked about the inscription on the Statue of Liberty. He suggested the famous lines be updated to read, "Give me your tired and your poor who can stand on their own two feet and who will not become a public charge," clarifying for the nation that the poem had always contained an asterisk it had simply neglected to engrave. He added that the verse had originally referred to people coming from Europe, settling a separate question no one had asked.

"We want people that can come in and be productive, that can support themselves," the President said of the rule, describing an immigration system oriented toward those who arrive already self-sufficient and therefore, by the logic of the policy, least in need of immigrating anywhere. An official within the administration, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the measure simply asked of newcomers what the country had always quietly hoped for, which was that they bring their own money.

Immigration advocates noted that the rule's most measurable effect was on people it did not technically cover, as immigrant families across the country, uncertain whether enrolling would jeopardize a relative's status, began withdrawing themselves and their U.S.-citizen children from Medicaid, food assistance, and children's health programs. The administration characterized this chilling effect as Americans voluntarily declining to be a burden, a development it had encouraged and now welcomed.

The rule was promptly enjoined by several federal courts before the Supreme Court permitted it to take effect, allowing the wealth test to be applied to roughly the people it was written to exclude until a later administration rescinded it.

At press time, the Statue of Liberty was reportedly still holding her torch aloft, awaiting clarification on whether the figures arriving by sea had cleared the appropriate income threshold.