Beginning January 1, 2024, illegal aliens residing in California will become eligible for taxpayer-funded health insurance — the first state in the nation to enact such a policy.
In June of this year, Newsom touted the budget agreement that will make California the first state in the United States to offer health insurance, subsidized by taxpayers, to the state’s estimated 4.4 million illegal aliens so long as they are low-income.
Starting in the new year, illegal aliens in California will qualify for Medi-Cal, which is California’s state-funded version of the federal government’s Medicaid program. Since 2015, only illegal alien children qualified for Medi-Cal thanks to then-Gov. Jerry Brown (D).
Likewise, Newsom expanded eligibility for Medi-Cal to illegal aliens 50 years and older as well as those aged 19 to 25. This latest expansion is set to add about 764,000 Medi-Cal recipients to the state’s health insurance rolls.
Elected Republicans in California have warned that expanding taxpayer-funded health insurance to illegal aliens “will certainly exacerbate current provider access problems” as Medi-Cal “is already strained by serving 14.6 million Californians — more than a third of the state’s population.”
Eventually, California officials project that more than 1.2 million illegal aliens will be using subsidized health insurance.
The new policy comes as California’s population dipped below 39 million residents this year, driven mostly by Californians fleeing the state. The year prior, about 300,000 Californians moved out of the state — the most of any state in the nation that year.
John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Email him at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter here.
