Illegal Immigrants Have Fear of Obamacare

Forget computer crashes. Obamacare is now having a language problem.

As the Affordable Care Act prepares for a new enrollment period beginning Saturday, legal immigrants are fearful they might expose relatives in the United States illegally to deportation if they sign up.

Much of their worry is over the government’s failure to communicate properly in Spanish and other foreign languages, officials say.

If immigrants are in the United States legally, they are eligible for Obamacare coverage, and the healthcare exchanges will not release any information to U.S. immigration authorities, the officials insist.

"We have to address the issue of immigration status head on," Peter Lee, executive director of the Covered California health exchange, told the Los Angeles Times. “We need trusted voices saying it’s safe."

Covered California compounded the problem when it opened last year but failed to provide healthcare application forms in Spanish, the language spoken by the vast majority of immigrants there. About 62 percent of those who still have on insurance are Hispanic, and about half of those are illegal immigrants.

Now the program plans to spend $95 million on marketing and outreach to U.S. citizens and legal immigrants.

The issue of fear of deportation arose as President Barack Obama is warning that he plans to issue an executive order to grant amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants, a move that could make them eligible for taxpayer-subsidized health care.

"President Obama is expected to receive Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson and Attorney General Eric Holder's recommendations for executive amnesty by the end of next week," the Federation for American Immigration Reform reported.

"Additionally, Obama administration sources revealed that the president is considering further reducing deportations as well as making changes to increase legal immigration. However, White House officials predict that President Obama will delay taking unilateral action until after Congress passes a bill to fund the government beyond mid-December."

Immigration activist groups are already suing the Obama administration for enforcing provisions of the healthcare act that prohibits illegal aliens from signing up. And they are also complaining about a language problem.

The Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights and the Southeast Asian Mutual Assistance Associations Coalition in Philadelphia filed cases against the government after 115,000 people were removed from the health-care program because they failed to prove they were U.S. citizens or legal immigrants.

One immigrant advocate accused the health-care program of “completely failing on the language-access provision" because the government sent cancellation notices only in English or Spanish.

The Los Angeles Times story featured a Hispanic family apparently with illegal immigrant members. One daughter, Lilian Saldana, told the Times that she turned down Obamacare last year and might do it again because she does not trust the government to protect her privacy. She fears immigration officials might find out about her parents. The Times says only that the parents are "immigrants who are not citizens."

"My family’s being held back whether I apply for it or not," she told the Times. "There’s nothing I can do about it."

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