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On May 10, 2023, Governor Ron DeSantis (R-FL) signed Senate Bill 1718, a bill focused on amending Florida immigration policy.
The bill, which DeSantis framed as “the strongest anti-illegal immigration bill in the nation to combat the Biden border crisis,” was viewed at the time as a key component of his presidential run.
SB-1718 requires hospitals to ask about legal immigration status as a way to quantify the amount of money healthcare services for non-citizen immigrants are costing the state of Florida.
This particular portion of the bill has made headlines as uncertainties around the new reality under SB-1718 grew. Additionally, starting November 1, 2024, Texas will be joining Florida in this policy practice.
Data from KFF reports that in Florida and Texas, one in every 10 people is a non-citizen immigrant, meaning that these healthcare policies affect at least 10% of the population in both states.
However, the Agency for Health Care Administration in the State of Florida issued Gov. DeSantis the Annual Legislative Hospital Immigration Data Report, which found there was no correlation between uncompensated care and the non-citizen immigration population.
“We were not able to find any obvious correlation between the level of uncompensated care and the level of illegal aliens presenting at the hospital,” the report stated. “High levels of uncompensated care are more associated with rural county status than illegal immigration percentages.”
Despite the conclusions of the report, DeSantis has continued to push anti-immigration legislation and display inflammatory rhetoric. A report by Harvard Public Health found that DeSantis’ political rhetoric has fueled confusion around the new law, leading to uncertainty for many families.
“Although Florida hospitals are required by the new immigration to ask about residency status, no one is required to answer,” Maria Plata, a project manager for Partners in Health, told Harvard Public Health.
However, many Floridians have avoided seeking healthcare services out of fear. One such example of this is Petra, who migrated to Florida from Mexico two decades ago.
Petra, a mother of four, told Harvard Public Health that when her nine-month-old baby needed medical care in June 2023, she was nervous as she did not know how she would be treated at the hospital under the new Florida law.
Petra’s attitude toward healthcare services is shared by immigrants across the state, especially in prenatal care. Executive Director of the nonprofit Healthy Start Coalition, Thelisha Thomas, said the clinic has seen at least a 10 percent decrease in the number of pregnancies the clinic directly oversees.
State Rep. Anna Eskamani (D-FL) spoke out against the new law and its effect on prenatal care.
“We’re a state that prides itself on being pro-family,” Eskamani said. “It just seems antithesis to that when you create these barriers for someone getting the care they need.”
Despite the adverse effects of the new law and the pushback from lawmakers and advocacy groups such as the ACLU, Governor Greg Abbott (R-TX) followed in Florida’s footsteps on August 9, 2024.
Gov. Abbott issued an Executive Order requiring the Texas Health and Human Services Commission “to collect information on illegal immigrants who use Texas public hospitals for inpatient and emergency care and to report incurred healthcare costs” on account of “the Biden-Harris Administration’s reckless open border policies.”
After seeing the reality of SB-1718 play out in Florida, advocates are worried that individuals within the immigrant community will be deterred from seeking the healthcare they need in Texas after the November 1, 2024 start date.
Rene Martinez, president of Council 100 of the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC-100), said the order is a political tactic based on hate, which is being used to create fear and divisions during the election year.
Texas physicians encourage anyone, regardless of their immigrant status, to seek medical care as necessary.
If the executive order survives the anticipated legal challenges, the impacts seen on healthcare in Florida are likely to soon extend to Texas. As November 1 approaches, the security of healthcare for Texas’s population of immigrants hangs in the balance.
If, as stated by Martinez, this order is a hate-based political tactic, it is a tactic with a high cost for immigrants living in Texas. If anti-immigration legislation like this continues to spread across border states, it has the potential to not only act as a detriment to the health of immigrants but also to foster an atmosphere of fear and division among communities with large immigrant populations.
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