The law in the U.S. already forbids unauthorized immigrants from accessing any federally subsidized health coverage, such as Medicaid, the Affordable Care Act, or the Children’s Health Insurance Program, which was established by a 1996 law.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., said Republicans are “lying” about the Democratic bill out of weakness.

“Democrats have never proposed changes to this federal law,” another statement noted a day before the shutdown. “The real question is whether the president is committed to safeguarding Americans’ health care.”

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The facts

The Republican claim is highly misleading.

The Democratic bill would not change existing law barring people who are in the U.S. illegally from getting federal health care coverage.

The dispute centers around immigrants whom the federal government has decreed as “lawfully present,” but who haven’t formally been given legal status that is enforceable in court.

There are an estimated 1.4 million people considered “lawfully present” in the United States — including Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program beneficiaries, who came to the U.S. illegally as children; people who have Temporary Protected Status; and refugees and people seeking asylum who are still going through the legal process. Republicans are seeking to prohibit Medicaid or ACA eligibility for those groups.

They are not “undocumented” or “illegal” immigrants. The government knows who they are, and many are going through the process of seeking official legal status or green cards. Among other things, they are not unlawful border-crossers who have been flagged for deportation.

The GOP law prohibited those “lawfully present” immigrants from accessing federal health care programs. The Democratic bill would restore that access — but not for undocumented people who lack protected status — while also restoring the $1 trillion in Medicaid cuts, a core goal for Democrats.

The White House defended its claim by pointing to one portion of the “big beautiful bill” that Democrats are seeking to repeal, a section called “Alien Medicaid eligibility.” That section establishes the new limitations on health care access for lawfully present immigrants (“alien” is the federal term used to describe a noncitizen).

The White House also says the Biden administration abused the immigration parole program to grant temporary entry to the U.S. for people who shouldn’t have received it. But if the Trump administration revoked that parole status, those individuals would lose their eligibility for any health care coverage under the Democratic proposal.

Another provision in the Democratic bill would extend subsidies that keep health insurance premiums low for people insured through the Affordable Care Act, which are set to expire later this year. Undocumented immigrants are already barred from accessing that money, and nothing in the Democrats’ bill changes that.