FILE – In this Nov. 12, 2019 file photo, people demonstrate outside the Supreme Court over President Donald Trump’s decision to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, File)
MARYLAND – CASA Maryland is praising the decision by the Biden administration to allow DACA recipients to enroll in the ACA and Medicaid healthcare programs.
In a statement to 47ABC, CASA MD Research & Policy Analyst Ninfa Amador said ” We commend the administration’s leadership and reiterate that DACA holders and immigrants should never have been excluded, to begin with. We’re happy to see DACA recipients will now be able to have healthcare coverage. The Access to Care, a bill that included DACA recipients as well as undocumented immigrants, was a missed opportunity for Maryland to make a similar announcement and move in step with national leaders on expanding healthcare to all regardless of status. After the bill was widely supportedin its decision to delay expanding this basic human right of healthcare for another year, the legislature is shirking its responsibility to the people it represents, and we implore them to consider the lives of hundreds of immigrant children and adults that will be impacted but their decision.”
The HHS estimates that the decision might open up enrollment for over 500,000 people nation wide.
Amador tells 47ABC that despite the respite for DACA recipients, the failure of the Access to Care Act has left thousands of Marylanders without healthcare, and will raise premiums for all policyholders.
“The lack of this bill going through means an increase in uncompensated care here in the state as more individuals go to the emergency room for their checkups it means higher premiums for all of us that pay into the individual marketplace,” she said.
Amador tells 47ABC that a study found that of the 300,000 undocumented workers in the state over 80,000 would have enrolled had the measure moved forward, with many of those uninsured being young children and teens.
She says her group hopes to persuade members in the MD Senate next session, and says they are working on providing more detailed tracking and statistics of the community as requested by lawmakers.
“But as we wait for the next year, there are people with conditions, and their quality of life and access to care is still critical,” Amador said.
