CHICAGO, October 13, 2025: A new report recently published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) reveals that undocumented immigrants accounted for less than one percent of the total annual Medicaid expenditures. Central to the federal government shutdown is healthcare with the Democrats demanding the extension of tax credits for the Affordable Care Act while the Republicans are unwilling to extend them at this time.
A sticking point between the parties on healthcare is that the Republicans argue that the Democrats “want to give massive amounts of money, hundreds of millions of dollars, to illegal aliens for their healthcare,” said JD Vance on September 29.
The Democrats have framed the federal shutdown as the battle to keep healthcare insurance premiums affordable. Unless Congress acts soon, the enhanced premium tax credits in the Affordable Healthcare Act are set to expire at the end of the year. It is expected that many Americans will see significantly higher healthcare insurance premiums starting in 2026. Early enrollment begins on November 1. Congress must extend the subsidies to show consumers lower subsidized premiums before open enrollment begins.
If the Republican acquiesce on reversing the H.R. 1 healthcare costs it will not increases healthcare coverage to undocumented immigrants according to a Georgetown University factcheck released last week.
According to the October 9 JAMA research letter, investigators found that emergency Medicaid expenditures, which is the Medicaid provision available to undocumented immigrants accounted for 0.4% of the total Medicaid expenditures during fiscal year 2022, the latest data available.
According to the study, states with a larger immigrant population had higher expenditures in emergency Medicaid. However, none of the states reported that emergency coverage rose above one percent of the total emergency Medicaid healthcare costs.
The study shows that if the Republicans were to agree to extend the healthcare subsidies demanded by the Democrats the impact by undocumented immigrants would be negligible.
Now in its 13th day of the shutdown and federal workers missing their first paychecks last week, the American people seem to be equally divided over who is to blame while not being too concerned about it, a recent Reuters/Ipsos poll found.
The poll found that 50% of the Americans polled want the parties to compromise on the issue with only the Republicans (53%) wanting their party to stand by their position. At 37%, the poll shows that Americans are equally blaming the Democrats and Donald Trump for the shutdown.
Nonetheless, Americans at 34% of those polled are not concerned about the shutdown with 63% at least “somewhat concerned.” The poll, however, did not account for layoffs of federal workers announced by the Trump Administration over the weekend.
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