The Trump administration will hand over the personal data of 79 million Medicaid recipients to ICE

The Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency will have access to the personal data of 79 million people enrolled in Medicaid, the government health insurance program for low-income individuals. Federal agents will use this information to locate immigrants who are in the country unlawfully in order to accelerate President Donald Trump’s deportation machinery.

The information of beneficiaries of the federal and state program will be shared with ICE under an agreement between the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) signed last Monday, according to AP, which obtained access to the agreement that has not yet been made public. Immigration agents will use this data to identify and locate undocumented immigrants, according to the document cited by the news agency.

With the Medicaid database, ICE officials will have access to the names, addresses, dates of birth, ethnic and racial information, as well as Social Security numbers of all people enrolled in the program. According to AP, the agreement between DHS and CMS does not allow immigration agents to download each person’s data. Instead, they will be permitted to access the information for a limited period until September 9.

It’s unclear whether DHS has yet accessed the CMS information. DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement to the AP that both agencies “are exploring an initiative to ensure that illegal aliens are not receiving Medicaid benefits that are meant for law-abiding Americans.”

It should be clarified that immigrants who do not legally reside in the United States cannot enroll in the Medicaid program, which is jointly funded by the federal government and the states. To qualify, an immigrant must be legally in the country and fit into one of several categories established by the government. These include refugees, asylum seekers, people who have had parole for at least one year, individuals granted deferred deportation, or victims of human trafficking, among others.

However, federal law requires all states to offer emergency Medicaid, a temporary coverage that pays only for life-saving emergency room services to anyone, including non-U.S. citizens. Immigrants frequently use it, regardless of their legal status in the country.

Additionally, seven states — all governed by Democrats — allow noncitizens full access to the state Medicaid program in their respective territories. These are California, New York, Colorado, Washington, Oregon, Illinois, and Minnesota. The states launched these programs during the administration of former president Joe Biden and pledged not to bill the federal government to cover the health care costs of immigrants who used them.

In June, the Trump administration ordered Medicaid officials in some of these states — California, Illinois, and Washington — and in Washington, D.C., which also allows immigrants to enroll in its program, to hand over the data of millions of beneficiaries to ICE officials. And earlier this month, 20 states sued the Republican administration, alleging it violated federal health privacy laws.

This new agreement is just the latest escalation in the Trump administration’s anti-immigrant crusade, which aims to deport one million people in its first year in office. In addition to ongoing raids nationwide, the Republican government has resorted to other measures to increase detention and deportation numbers, including canceling programs that granted legal protections against deportation to thousands of immigrants. Another similar agreement was made public last April, when the IRS also agreed to share its data with ICE, so the agency could track undocumented immigrants.

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