New rules under consideration by the Trump administration would make it tougher for immigrants on welfare to get green cards. It\u2019s time to get cracking.<\/p>\n
More than half of all noncitizen children and teens in the United States receive taxpayer-funded assistance, mostly Medicaid, while nearly half of all noncitizen adults legally in the country are on some form of welfare, according to the Migration Policy Institute<\/a>.<\/p>\n The MPI report found 54.2 percent of noncitizen minors up to age 17 receive at least one of four major public welfare benefits (Medicaid, cash welfare, food stamps or Social Security benefits). For those ages 18-54, the figure is 46.3 percent, and 47.8 percent for older aliens.<\/p>\n By comparison, 32 percent of the U.S.-born population receives some form of welfare. That\u2019s not great but, as we are tirelessly told, legal immigrants are, on average, more highly educated than the native-born.<\/p>\n