The House of Representatives narrowly passed legislation Wednesday to crack down on illegal immigrants participating in welfare fraud, despite fierce objections from most Democrats.<\/p>\n
Lawmakers voted <\/strong>231-186 <\/strong>to approve the Deporting Fraudsters Act, with 186 Democrats opposing the measure.<\/p>\n The bill, sponsored by Rep. David Taylor, R-Ohio, would amend the Immigration and Nationality Act to explicitly define fraud as a deportable offense. Republicans said the legislation is necessary to ensure that noncitizens who steal taxpayer dollars<\/a> are no longer eligible for immigration relief services or legal protections.<\/p>\n “If you admit to or you\u2019re convicted of fraudulently receiving public benefits, you are out of here on the next plane and can never return,” Rep. Tom McClintock, R-Calif., said Wednesday on the House floor.<\/p>\n WALZ\u2019S MINNESOTA MESS COULD SPARK THE TOUGHEST FRAUD REFORMS IN DECADES<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n Democratic lawmakers largely opposed the GOP-authored bill, arguing that noncitizens convicted of fraud are already eligible for deportation.<\/p>\n “Another week, another redundant and completely unnecessary immigration crime bill,” Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., said during debate on the measure.\u00a0<\/p>\n Democrats also sharply criticized the measure for eroding legal immigrants\u2019 due process rights by permitting noncitizens to be deported prior to prosecutors securing a conviction.<\/p>\n “By bypassing the conviction requirement, this legislation would hand a liberal get-out-of-jail free card to immigrants who commit fraud by deporting them without going through the criminal justice system and giving their victims a day in court,” Raskin said.<\/p>\n GOP lawmakers<\/a> countered that there is no language in the bill that prevents noncitizens from being prosecuted for alleged fraud prior to removal from the country.<\/p>\n HAWLEY TARGETS MINNESOTA FRAUD, CCP-LINKED MONEY AT SENATE HEARING: ‘TAXPAYERS ROBBED BLIND’<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n The bill is likely dead on arrival in the Senate given widespread opposition from Democrats. Under Senate rules, most legislation must overcome a 60-vote threshold to advance to a vote on final passage.<\/p>\n The vote follows heightened scrutiny from House Republicans on welfare fraud nationwide.<\/p>\n The House Oversight Committee in December launched a probe into massive welfare fraud<\/u><\/a> involving Minnesota\u2019s social services programs. Federal prosecutors say as much as $9 billion in taxpayer money may have been stolen in various fraud schemes and have charged nearly 100 individuals, including many of Somali descent.<\/p>\n House Republicans have also spotlighted reporting from independent journalist Nick Shirley, who has probed alleged daycare fraud in Minnesota and California.<\/p>\n “We have already seen why action is needed,” Rep. Claudia Tenney, R-N.Y., said Tuesday during a House GOP leadership news conference. “Independent journalist Nick Shirley helped expose a massive fraud scheme, showing how organized and widespread these scams can become even when oversight fails.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The House of Representatives narrowly passed legislation Wednesday to crack down on illegal immigrants participating in welfare fraud, despite fierce objections from most Democrats. Lawmakers voted 231-186 to approve the Deporting Fraudsters Act, with 186 Democrats opposing the measure. The bill, sponsored by Rep. David Taylor, R-Ohio, would amend the Immigration and Nationality Act to … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-69359","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69359","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=69359"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69359\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=69359"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=69359"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=69359"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}