Volunteers help immigrants with US citizenship applications to a Citizenship Now! Event organized by the City University of New York (CUNY) on March 12, 2016 in the Bronx in New York.(Photo: John Moore, Getty Images)

As soon as it was announced that the Trump administration had become proposing a radical change to limit the number of immigrants who can receive green cards according to their use of government benefits, the phone began ringing constantly in the offices of Liza Galindo.

The immigration attorney in Miami Springs, Florida, said it was difficult to advise clients on what they should do because the proposed rules, which will be released on Wednesday in the Federal Register, will only come into effect for months and could change significantly before. then.

"Unfortunately, we have to wait until it happens," she said. "What I advise them, it's" We do not know yet. "

According to the proposal of the Trump administration, this combination of fear and confusion created by the new 447-page rules was designed in part.

Basically, the new rules would significantly expand the type of government benefits that, if used by immigrants, would prevent them from becoming legal permanent residents. The Department of Homeland Security says that the use of benefits is an indication that the immigrant will likely become a "public office" dependent on government services at some point in the future.

But the proposal goes even further, explicitly stating that "concerns about the consequences" of the use of a public benefit may drive immigrants out of programs "even though these individuals are otherwise eligible to benefits ".

David Super, a law professor at Georgetown University, who studies poverty and inequality, said the government's efforts to promote uncertainty had created a "chilling effect" among immigrants who are now paranoid public services to which they are legally entitled.

For example, although most immigrants can not get food stamps or federal housing assistance, they can use the Special Supplementary Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children, known as WIC. This federal program helps pregnant women, breastfeeding women and children under 5 who are at nutritional risk.

Super said he had heard from clinics that immigrants were now abandoning this assistance, putting the health of these families at risk. But their decision to abandon the program raises another dilemma.

The proposed regulation does not expressly prohibit the WIC, which means that immigrants should be able to continue to receive it. But Super explained that the regulations were written in such a way as to give immigration officers wide latitude to refuse green card applications based on the "totality of circumstances" of each applicant, including his use of government services. , his health, his age, his family situation and his training. and other factors.

"(The use of WIC) should not affect you, but given the criteria of circumstances so open, many people do not want to take the risk," he said.

The Department of Homeland Security recognizes that the new regulations will limit the number of people who can receive green cards. It is estimated that more than 380,000 green card applications per year will be scrutinized. But the ministry says it is necessary to deny people who will become public office and save $ 2.27 billion a year to US taxpayers.

The rules will now go through a 60-day public comment period and the administration will be able to modify them in response to comments from people opposed to or in favor of the new rules.

Democrats in Congress have denounced the proposed rules.

Senator Tammy Duckworth, D-Ill., Whose mother is an immigrant from Thailand, described the proposal as "insensitive as dangerous".

"When I was in high school, my family was on the verge of homelessness and relied on good food to survive," she said in a recent statement. "My own mother is an immigrant – and if this proposal had been put in place in those years, my family might have had to choose between citizenship and hunger.

"No family should have to make that choice. No one should have to choose between the urgent need for health care – or shelter or food – and being snatched from loved ones. This proposal is not simply unfair. It's cruel, unacceptable and anti-American. "

Regardless of the administration's decision, its new rules will almost certainly encourage most immigration lawyers in the country to warn their clients to be cautious about the government benefits they have taken out or risk not getting the insurance. permanent residence.

Gerald Burns, an immigration lawyer in Chandler, Arizona, said he had spoken to immigrant parents who were considering taking their children out of public assistance so as not to jeopardize their green card applications. "It's a difficult call for a parent," he said.

Burns said he thought the changes proposed by the administration were intended to discourage immigrants from asking for green cards and other immigration benefits.

"That's all that Trump and his administration have done," he said. "Everything is done to discourage immigration. Period."

Galindo said immigrants should be cautious in the months ahead when preparing their taxes, for example. She stated that tax preparers do their job by identifying all the tax benefits available to their clients, but that immigrants must carefully review their tax returns to ensure that they will not receive any tax credits. tax that could compromise their green card applications under the proposed rules.

Mary Carmen Madrid Crost, a lawyer specializing in immigration law in Chicago, said that immigrants also had to pay attention when they were dealing with notaries, common title for a lawyer in Latin America, but generally referring to a less qualified notary in the United States.

She said such notaries can give immigrants terrible advice on changes in the regulation of public burdens that could jeopardize their green card applications.

Madrid Crost said that immigrants seeking the help of social workers should also be alert. These workers, in order to help immigrants, often enroll them in available government services, including federal, regional and local programs. Each of these could be imputed to immigrants if the proposed rules come into effect.

This is the new reality faced by immigrants, said Madrid Crost, as the Trump administration continues to rewrite rules and regulations to limit the ability of legal and illegal immigrants to enter or stay in the United States .

"We call it the invisible wall," she said. "I do not try to announce my sadness, but we must be vigilant about what is happening."

The Republic of Arizona reporter Daniel Gonzalez also contributed.

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