Senate DFLers Condemn Release of Medicaid Enrollee Data to Immigration Officials

ST. PAUL, Minn. — On July 17, AP News reported that the Trump administration has ordered the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to share enrollees’ identifying information, including names and addresses, with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials for the explicit purpose of locating and arresting undocumented immigrants.

The undersigned members of the Senate Human Services Committee and Senate Health and Human Services Committee release the following statement:

“The Trump Administration’s move to release the personal information of 79 million Americans to ICE sets a dangerous precedent. Hospitals and clinics are meant to be places of safety and healing, not surveillance hubs for federal agents. This profound invasion of individual privacy will undermine trust in public institutions, and it will harm people.

“This policy is a racist, xenophobic escalation meant to intimidate undocumented immigrants into silence, deny them medical care, and condemn them to untreated illness and death. Additionally, by giving ICE access to ethnicity data, the administration is openly using race as a proxy for immigration status, which is morally indefensible and likely unconstitutional. 

“We condemn these actions, and we call on our Congressional colleagues — Democrat and Republican — to use their power to stop the Trump Administration’s racist, xenophobic mission to harm our neighbors. Every person, regardless of immigration status or race, has the right to seek health care without fear of being hunted down. This is about basic human dignity, and we will not stay silent.”

This statement is signed by Health and Human Services Committee Chair Senator Melissa Wiklund (DFL-Bloomington), Senator Liz Boldon (DFL-Rochester), Senator Omar Fateh (DFL-Minneapolis), Senator Rob Kupec (DFL-Moorhead), Senator Alice Mann (DFL-Edina), Senator Erin Maye Quade (DFL-Apple Valley), Senator Zaynab Mohamed (DFL-Minneapolis), and Senator Lindsey Port (DFL-Burnsville).

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Senator Melissa Wiklund
Melissa Wiklund represents District 51, which includes Richfield, Eastern Bloomington, and Minneapolis: parts of Nokomis neighborhood. Senator Wiklund is Chair of the Health and Human Services Committee and serves on the Commerce and Consumer Protection, Finance, and Human Services Committees.

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Assistant Leader Senate District 25
Senator Liz Boldon represents Senate District 25 which includes Rochester and Oronoco. She is vice chair of the Housing and Homelessness Prevention Committee, and serves on the Education Policy Committee, Elections Committee, and Health and Human Services Committee.
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Assistant Leader Senate District 62
Omar Fateh represents Senate District 62, which covers the community of South Minneapolis.

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Assistant Leader Senate District 4
Senator Rob Kupec represents Senate District 4, which includes Becker and Clay County. He is vice chair of the Agriculture, Broadband, and Rural Development Committee, and serves on the Health and Human Services Committee, Higher Education Committee, and Labor Committee.
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Assistant Leader Senate District 50
Senator Alice Man represents Senate District 50 which includes Bloomington and Edina. She is vice chair of the Health and Human Services Committee, and serves on the Education Policy Committee and the Human Services Committee.

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Assistant Leader Senate District 56
Senator Erin Maye Quade represents Senate District 56 which includes Apple Valley, Eagan and Rosemount. She is vice chair of the Education Policy Committee, and serves on the Education Finance Committee, Human Services Committee, and the State and Local Government and Veterans Committee.
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Assistant Leader Senate District 63
Senator Zaynab Mohamed represents Senate District 63 which includes Minneapolis - Neighborhoods: Longfellow, Nokomis, parts of Powderhorn and Southwest. She is vice chair of the Jobs and Economic Development Committee, and serves on the Capital Investment Committee, Finance Committee, and the Housing and Homelessness Prevention Committee.
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Assistant Leader Senate District 55
Lindsey Port represents Senate District 55, which covers the communities of Savage and parts of Burnsville.

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