- calendar_today August 13, 2025
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WASHINGTON (CN) — The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services announced Tuesday a new effort to increase enrollment oversight of public health programs, requiring state Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Programs (CHIP) to remove illegal immigrants from their rolls. The enforcement of new rules was first reported by CMS officials.
CMS Administrator Chiquita Brooks-LaSure said the move will implement new screening for Medicaid and CHIP enrollees. The action, which affects the nation’s public health programs, was first announced by CMS officials. “CMS is announcing a new nationwide system that will help states maintain the integrity of the Medicaid and CHIP programs by using federal databases to ensure that individuals enrolled are eligible for those programs,” said Brooks-LaSure in a statement.
In order to verify each state’s enrollee list, the CMS will begin sending monthly enrollment reports that will identify any beneficiaries whose status is in question. In addition to cross-checking federal databases, CMS said that it would rely on databases of the Social Security Administration and DHS’s SAVE (Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements) program in order to detect individuals whose citizenship and immigration status remain in doubt.
CMS reports released to the public on Tuesday show the first wave of such notifications to states, according to agency officials. States will continue to receive such reports throughout the month, and they are obligated to report back to the CMS with results of the new system in place. If state Medicaid or CHIP enrollees are found to be ineligible due to their immigration status, those individuals will be removed from the program.
“We are tightening oversight of enrollment to safeguard taxpayer dollars and guarantee that these vital programs serve only those who are truly eligible under the law,” Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said in a statement.
Mehmet Oz, acting administrator of CMS, added that the enrollment verification system “will ensure states have the tools they need to safeguard taxpayer dollars and preserve the integrity of these programs.”
CMS’s expanded verification requirements come months after the Department of Health and Human Services adopted a new federal definition of public benefits. The administration expanded the definition of public benefits in April from 31 to 44 programs.
The fight over citizenship verification was first prompted by an executive order that President Donald Trump signed as he was sworn in to his second term in January. The order called for the heads of federal agencies to review all public benefits programs in order to determine if any non-citizens were improperly receiving assistance. Trump also directed agencies in his order to tighten rules as needed to ensure federal benefit programs were not being used in ways contrary to a 1996 law.
The order cited the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act, a 1996 law signed by President Bill Clinton that created rules for some public benefit programs to be used for noncitizens, but barred undocumented immigrants from receiving most forms of government aid. The order also claimed that states “should not be required to incur the administrative burden and costs of complying with federal agencies’ verification requirements,” referring to an order issued by the Obama administration in the waning days of his presidency.
Months before that first wave of notifications, a federal judge in the District of Columbia last month ordered the Trump administration to stop sharing Medicaid enrollee information with immigration officials. The Department of Health and Human Services and the Social Security Administration began the practice of sharing enrollee information to assist Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) with deportation efforts, which the judge ruled overstepped the HHS’s legal authority. In response to the ruling, agency spokesman Joe English said at the time: “HHS will comply with the court’s order and we are reviewing it.”
The notification requirements are new requirements that states will have to face as a part of the $858 billion Republican funding bill approved last month. That law required the states to conduct eligibility checks on Medicaid enrollees at least twice per year. Checks had not previously been required more than once per year. The administration is facing legal pushback on the new verification rule from a group of more than 20 Democratic attorneys general. The coalition, which includes California, New Jersey, and Illinois, has sued the HHS in New York state court over the new requirements. New York Attorney General Letitia James has argued that the requirement to verify enrollees’ immigration status for federally funded benefit programs will affect access to social services.
“This administration is advancing federal rules that are profoundly out of step with the nation’s most effective and inclusive public programs,” James said last month. “For decades, states like New York have built health, education, and family support systems that serve anyone in need. These programs work because they are open, accessible, and grounded in compassion. Now, the federal government is pulling that foundation out from under us overnight, jeopardizing cancer screenings, early childhood education, primary care, and so much more. This is a baseless attack on some of our country’s most effective and inclusive public programs, and we will not let it stand.”
