The fight over taxpayer subsidies for non-citizen migrant health care in Illinois continues as a new audit shows Illinois taxpayers’ costs ballooned beyond estimates and total $1.6 billion over three years.
An Illinois Auditor General report on Health Benefits for Immigrant Seniors and Adults showed overall costs from 2021 to 2023 were up to 286% higher than estimated, totalling more than $897 million. There were also eligibility errors with poor internal controls.
On the House floor, state Rep. Amy Elik, R-Alton, said the audit shows Republican concerns were valid.
“It is not enough for us to say ‘I told you so,’ we must do better,” Elik said. “Now is the time and this is our opportunity to work for taxpayers, not promote fraud and overspending.”
Pushing for universal health care, Gov. J.B. Pritzker said the audit didn’t tell the whole story.
“It may be their immigration status, it may be because they got a job that has health care coverage associated with it, but you expect them to move on and maybe they didn’t move on either because they didn’t know they could, should,” Pritzker said at an unrelated event in Chicago. More here