by John Binder
A plan by President Joe Biden to give amnesty to millions of illegal aliens would cost American taxpayers nearly $500 billion over the course of two decades, a new analysis reveals.
Late last month, House Democrats passed the filibuster-proof “Build Back Better” reconciliation package which includes an amnesty for nearly seven million illegal aliens. Effectively, millions of illegal aliens would be able to secure parole through the legislation and thus be shielded from deportation while gaining work permits to compete against working class Americans for jobs.
A new analysis by the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) states that over a 20-year period, the amnesty will cost American taxpayers more than $483 billion, based on figures from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO).
CIS Director of Research Steven Camarota writes that much of the cost is a result of the amnesty’s opening a number of federal welfare programs to illegal aliens:
The primary reason a parole amnesty would result in large new expenditures according to the CBO is that amnesty recipients would be able to receive Affordable Care Act subsidies, Medicaid, the Earned Income and Child Tax Credits, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, often called food stamps), Social Security, and Medicare to a much greater extent than they would without legal status. [Emphasis added]
Though providing a look into the fiscal cost of the amnesty plan, the CBO figures do not factor in the millions to billions in lost wages and jobs that such a plan may have as illegal aliens would be legally allowed to compete for jobs against Americans.
Specifically, the amnesty would allow illegal aliens to obtain work permits, driver’s licenses, and documents to travel abroad for at least a decade so long as they can prove that they have been residing in the United States since 2010.
Every year, 1.2 million legal immigrants receive green cards to permanently resettle in the U.S. In addition, 1.4 million foreign nationals are given visas to take American jobs. On top of legal immigration levels, federal officials expect that more than two million illegal aliens will have tried to cross into the U.S., many successfully, in the last year.
John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News.