I think the Senator from Florida is really putting his finger on a different Issue. and it is a very real issue for anyone who considers. in this instance. large public hospitals. I think all of us understand the real crisis public hospitals have in serving the needy in all of our great communities and cities. As I understand the point of the Senator from Florida. if someone is a legal immigrant and has a sponsor and arrives &t the Boston City Hospital. that person is going to be treated right away. As the Senator pointed out. we are required to treat him. but it is the hospital policy. in any event. to treat that individual. So they get treated right away. Their emergency is attended to. Now the hospital goes about saying. "How are we going to recover the payments for it?" It goes to the individual. That person happens to be needy. happens to be poor. and happens to be a legal immigrant. The point. No. 1. Mr. President. is that the foreignborn immigrants in the United States represent 6 percent of the population and only 8 percent of the utilization in the Medicaid Program. We do not find the abuses in the Medicaid Program. We do in the SSI. which has been addressed in this with effective measures over the period of the next 10 years. But this program we are talking about is not more heavily used by legal immigrants than it is by American citizens. We have to understand that. We are not going to take the time of the Senate to demonstrate how legal immigrants pay in billions of dollars more than they ever benefit from in terms of taxes. which they are glad and willing to do. We are talking about that individual who has fallen on hard times and has some kind of unforeseen accident. All right. that person goes in and they are attended to.
Keywords matched
immigrant immigrants