Congress passed a strict new law in 1996 that should have prohibited sponsored legal immigrants from accessing welfare benefits. We all know how that worked out, although most Americans don’t know why immigrants are allowed to sign up for Obamacare, SNAP, Section 8 housing payments, and other forms of welfare. Despite having a federal law on the books for 30 years prohibiting it, legal immigrants and their families brought in through chain migration have looted the treasury to the tune of trillions of taxpayer dollars. That all ends now, thanks to President Donald J. Trump.

Republicans took control of the House of Representatives in the historic 1994 landslide. One of the laws they passed in the wake of that was the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA) of 1996. The law bars a legal immigrant from accessing social services that are meant for Americans. Bill Clinton’s Department of Justice immediately issued a memo that created a giant loophole in the law, however.

We all know how the system works today. A shady employer sponsors a legal immigrant and then pays them less than a living wage that an American would demand. The immigrant goes on welfare to make up the difference in income. The American taxpayers are cheated out of a job, and their taxes go up to support the foreign worker. The shady employer and the foreign worker are the only ones who benefit.

The 1996 law barred lawful permanent residents from accessing “means-tested” welfare benefits. Sponsors of immigrants are required to sign Form I-864, which affirms that they are financially liable for any welfare benefits drawn by the immigrant. Under the law, sponsors are required to reimburse the agency for those benefits. If they refuse, a court can force the sponsor to pay the money back.

The law also requires the sponsor’s income to be considered when an immigrant applies for welfare. Since most green card sponsors are employers with deep pockets, it effectively excludes most legal immigrants from welfare benefits.

The purpose of the law was clear. Immigrants should be self-sufficient if they want to move to our country, and the American taxpayers have no responsibility to financially support these people.

The first draft of the 1996 legislation included definitions that covered all benefits based on financial need. Those definitions had to be taken out in the Senate because of procedural rules about the budget.

In 1997, Bill Clinton’s DOJ issued a memo declaring that because the definitions were “ambiguous,” the law didn’t apply to many means-based forms of welfare. This has effectively allowed both legal and illegal immigrants to sign up for many discretionary welfare programs that are funded by the federal government, even though the law says they can’t. This has been going on for 30 years.

The Trump DOJ just withdrew Bill Clinton’s 1997 opinion, and it has Democrats howling “racism” from the rooftops. The Trump administration is now going to start enforcing Form I-864, effective immediately.

Anyone who has sponsored an immigrant and signed Form I-864 (which covers most green card holders in the US) now has to reimburse the federal government. They’re on the hook for any taxpayer-funded benefits that their sponsored immigrant has received. Cheap labor isn’t quite so cheap when the government follows laws that are already on the books!

The DOJ has also directed all public assistance agencies to begin applying the sponsors’ income whenever an immigrant applies for welfare. This will kick most immigrants off the welfare rolls.

As Americans have learned during the ongoing Tim Walz Somali Fraud Extravaganza in Minnesota, 80% of all Somali households are drawing at least one form of welfare. 89% of Somali households with children receive welfare. That includes SNAP, Medicaid, and cash assistance. By comparison, only 21% of native-born Minnesotans use those same welfare programs.

We’ve been financially supporting immigrant populations in this country for 30 years. The laws prohibiting this have never been followed before. Congress has never gone back and tried to plug Bill Clinton’s loophole, which allowed immigrants to go on the dole.

That all ends now. What an amazing Christmas gift for the American people, from the greatest president we have ever had!