The Trump administration is developing a plan that will surely raise an alarm in California’s immigrant community: handing over personal data from millions of Medicaid recipients to federal immigration officials seeking to track Americans illegally.
Based on consistency signed this week at Medicare and Medicaid Services and Medical Land Secublant Secublant Secublant Secublant Secublant Secublate Secarts, a large amount of private information including home address, social security number and the race of 79 million Medicaid participants will allow immigrants and customs to perform a larger latitude to find the immigrants they suspect.
“ICE will use CMS data to allow ICE to receive the identity and location information of aliens determined by ICE,” the protocol said.
The plan has not been announced publicly and is the latest step in the Trump administration to collect sensitive information about people living in the United States as it tries to meet its commitments to combat illegal immigrants and arrest 3,000 undocumented immigrants every day. There will definitely be legal challenges.
Critics have been sending alarms since the Trump administration directed CMS last month
These states carry out state-funded Medicaid programs for immigrants who otherwise are not eligible for federal Medicaid and promise not to charge federal government fees.
California. Alex Padilla and Adam Schiff warned last month about potential violations of federal privacy laws Trump officials have developed plans to share personal health data.
“These actions not only raise ethical issues, but also run counter to the long-standing HHS policy and raise significant concerns about possible violations of federal law,” the Senator wrote in a letter to Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
“We are bothered that this administration intends to use personal private health information for the unrelated purposes of possible actions for legal non-citizens and mixed status families,” Padilla and Schiff said in a statement. “The HHS decision to share confidential health information with the Department of Homeland Security is significantly different from established federal privacy protections that should shock all Americans.”
Homeland Security spokesman Tricia McLaughlin declined to answer questions about whether immigration officials are now accessing personal Medicaid data or how they plan to use it.
“President Trump has always promised to protect Medicaid for qualified beneficiaries,” McLaughlin said in a statement. “This promise was fulfilled after Joe Biden flooded our country with tens of millions of illegal foreign CM and DHS flooding.
Undocumented immigration is not allowed to attend Medicaid, a common federal and state program that helps pay for medical expenses for low-income individuals. The plan also limits other legal presentation of immigration benefits, some of whom need to wait periods before gaining coverage.
However, federal law requires states to provide emergency Medicaid and provide emergency room lifesaving insurance to everyone, including non-U.S. citizens.
A 2024 Congressional Budget Office report found that between 2017 and 2023, a total of $27 billion was spent on emergency Medicaid for non-citizens. That figure was less than 1% of Medicaid’s overall spending during this period. Still, Trump and other federal leaders have been pushing for a reduction in Medicaid spending and alleging undocumented immigrants are taking advantage of the program.
Hannah Katch, a CMS adviser during the Biden administration, previously worked for California Medicaid, told the Times that the Trump administration expressed the Medicaid data program as an “incredible breach of trust.”
Katch said the data sent to the CMS by the state has certain protections and requirements in the regulations. She said that getting CMS to share information about Medicaid receptions outside the agency would have a devastating impact on people who rely on emergency Medicaid for intensive care.
“It’s an incredibly cruel action to make people afraid to seek care when they experience medical emergencies or when their children experience medical emergencies,” Katz said.
Elizabeth Laird, director of civic technology equity at the Center for Democracy and Technology, said that this sharing of data will further erode people’s trust in the government.
“By handing over our most sensitive health care data to ICE, health and public services, it has fundamentally betrayed the trust of nearly 80 million people,” she said in a statement to the Times.
“This jaw-dropping development proves that the government claims to use this information to prevent fraud is a Trojan horse, but will primarily promote its target of expelling millions of people,” she said. “More than 90% of rights fraud are committed by U.S. citizens, emphasizing the false pretense of sharing this information with ICE.”
The program to share Medicaid data is not the first time the Trump administration has attempted to share personal information across departments. In May, the Ministry of Agriculture told states that they had to hand over data about recipients who rushed to buy food benefits.
Last month, the California Medical Association. Warnings are that the Trump administration’s sharing of personal Medicaid data will put nearly 15 million patients and their families at risk statewide.
Sending sensitive patient information to deportation officials “will have a devastating impact on the community and get the care that everyone needs,” said Dr. René Bravo, president-elect of the CMA.
“Our job is not to protect the boundaries, it protects our patients and provides the best health care,” Bravo said in a statement. “When patients come to us, this is usually the most vulnerable period of their lives and we provide them with safe space for care.”
The Orange County Office of Immigration and Refugee Affairs notified the public last month that CMS has directed the sending of personal information from DHS to Medicaid admissions personnel, including non-citizens.
“The data provided for the purpose of managing health care can now be used to locate individuals for immigration enforcement or to challenge their future immigration applications,” the statement said.
The agency wrote that it has heard of increased anxiety among customers who are worried that if they seek medical care, they can use their personal information on them.
“We are concerned that this will further undermine trust in public institutions and care providers,” the agency wrote.
Orange County Supervisor Vicente Sarmiento represents a large Latino population, including Santa Ana and Anaheim.
He called the action a “brutal violation” and eroded people’s trust in the government.
“These actions discourage participation in health care, which means some people may not seek the health care they need,” he said in a statement. “This has harmed the entire community, caused serious public health problems and increased the cost of our health care system.”
Jose Serrano, director of the Orange County Office of Immigration and Refugee Affairs, said certain information about those who signed the benefits has long been shared with the state, and the state passes it on to the federal government for research, funding and qualification purposes.
“One of the different things during this period is that the message is targeting people, especially those who immigrate,” he said.
The situation has caused anxiety among the immigrant population in Orange County, Serrano said. Some have contacted the agency to ask if they can unregister or change their address from the program because of concern that they or their families may be targeted by immigration officials.
“The truth is that immigration spends more, invests more in our community and financially,” Serrano said. Unfortunately, this medical information “would be used by the same households who have already invested in our community through the tax they pay annually.”
