Lou Dobbs Show Promotes Myth That ‘Gaping Loophole’ Will Provide Health Care Coverage For ‘Illegals’
Lou Dobbs Show Promotes Myth That ‘Gaping Loophole’ Will Provide Health Care Coverage For ‘Illegals’
Last night, Lou Dobbs Show correspondent Lisa Sylvester reported that “people who break immigration laws” will be “rewarded” with free health care coverage due to “gaping loopholes” in the proposed health care bill. Sylvester interviewed right-wing immigration hardliners and health care opponents to make her case:
ROBERT RECTOR, HERITAGE FOUNDATION: What we’re doing is creating a new program for low-income people to give them free medical care and giving illegal immigrants free and total access to that system. It’s a huge transformation. It’s radically different than anything the country has done in the past.
SYLVESTER: An amendment was offered that would have enabled states to use the Welfare Eligibility data base to keep illegal immigrants from qualifying for health care benefits. But that amendment was defeated in committee on a party line vote. And there’s another provision in this bill that some Republicans take issue with. It says that if one member of a family is eligible to receive universal health coverage then the entire family is eligible. Representative Lamar Smith calls that another loophole that he says will permit illegal immigrants to receive taxpayer funded health coverage.
Watch it:
Far from “free and total access,” there is specific language in both the House and Senate bills that prohibits undocumented immigrants from obtaining any federal health care assistance. However, several conservatives are still whining about the failure of the Heller Amendment, which Sylvester also cites above. None of them have mentioned that the amendment would have given private insurance providers unprecedented access to the sensitive income and identity information of all those applying for health care assistance while curtailing the privacy and redress responsibilities that the Social Security Act requires of government agencies.
The second “loophole” that Smith falsely claims will allow undocumented immigrants to receive universal coverage through legal family members represents another distortion. The House bill clearly stipulates that only family members who are “affordable credit eligible individuals” will receive government assistance. “Affordable credit eligible individuals” are defined as someone who is lawfully present in the US.
Rather than requiring Americans to hand over sensitive information to private insurers, the eligibility provision is enforceable via less invasive documentation requirements. If Congress decides to take up comprehensive immigration reform, there’s also the likely possibility that illegal immigration will be addressed head-on by putting undocumented immigrants on a path to legalization which is when and how this whole topic should be addressed in the first place.
9 Responses to “Lou Dobbs Show Promotes Myth That ‘Gaping Loophole’ Will Provide Health Care Coverage For ‘Illegals’”
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This is yet another classic example of conservatives using immigrants as the boogyman to derail healthcare reform. We need less fear mongering and more solutions. Immigration should be addressed withing an immigration reform debate and healthcare should be addressed within the health care reform debate.
July 29th, 2009 at 4:50 pmThere is a gaping loophole in Leprosy Lou Dobbs’ truthiness on immigrants and everything else.
July 29th, 2009 at 4:59 pmWow. Not surprised that undocumented immigration would be used to push through an amendment that gives incredible power to exploitative corporations.
Also not surprised that Lou Dobbs would propagate nonsense about immigrants to voice an opinion on what’s current in the news…
July 29th, 2009 at 5:13 pmLou Dobbs is not the only one reporting this. I have seen a number of stories on this issue. La Raza, that racist group, is demanding that the illegal aliens get health care coverage. I called my Senator, Sen. Carper, to complain about this coverage for illegal aliens, and he said, (the staffer) “There is no coverage for illegal aliens”. I asked who pays for the anchor babies? There was a pause and he said, “We do”. I asked, when they get sick and go to the emergency room, who pays for that? He said, “We do”.
So then I asked, “What will change if this obamacare passes or not”? There was a long pause, silence. Then I said the only way to put an end to this free medical care for the illegal aliens is to get the illegal aliens back to their own Country where they belong! They are destroying this Country! Tell Carper to get the immigration laws ENFORCED! That IDIOT voted for AMNESTY for the illegal aliens 3 times! What a jerk!
When we get rid of the illegal aliensm we will get rid of all the problems that go with them. THAT IS A FACT!
July 30th, 2009 at 7:42 amLou Dobbs never lets truth get in the way of entertainment.
Check out the outrage over his birther comments and CNN’s refusal to distance their brand from his brand of crazy:
http://www.dobbsconspiracy.com
July 30th, 2009 at 8:25 amAlso, check out Dave Neiwert’s great “Dobbs-the-birther” post over at Crooks and Liars:
http://crooksandliars.com/david-neiwert/now-lou-dobbs-wants-pretend-he-was-j
July 30th, 2009 at 8:29 amLou Dobbs is a Gaping A**hole.
I don’t know why people like Delaware Bob even come to these site. Maybe he thinks he’s spying on us.
P.S. La Raza is not a “racist” group. It is merely an organization that pushes for better treatment of Hispanic people in America, which is long overdue.
July 30th, 2009 at 11:36 amAdd this onto Lou Dobbs’s “birther” nonsense and it is clear that Dobbs does not deserve his soapbox on CNN.
Folks like Delaware Bob should get a life and stop spreading their nativism and lies across the internet. The National Council of La Raza is not a racist group anymore than the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People is. It is a mainstream civil rights organization that advocates for the rights of Latinos.
July 30th, 2009 at 1:27 pmCan someone tell me how this will affect visiting family members of legal immigrants in this country? For eg. I am here on a work visa and will soon be getting my green card..If my parents come to visit me on a visitors visa would they be eligible for health insurance? Thanks
August 2nd, 2009 at 6:39 pm