“We’re delivering it regardless of immigration status to everyone up to the age of 26,” Newsom said, adding that the goal of universal coverage is “the right thing to do and it’s the fiscally responsible thing to do.” | AP Photo/Jeff Chiu
California Gov. Gavin Newsom and Donald Trump exchanged barbs Monday over the state offering health care to undocumented immigrants, demonstrating the enduring political potency of a cause embraced by Democratic presidential candidates.
A $214.8 billion budget Newsom signed last week — his first budget as governor — extends public health insurance to low-income immigrants who are in the country illegally up to the age of 26, expanding on California’s previous coverage extension to minors. While Newsom resisted Democratic legislators’ push to cover seniors as well, the Democratic governor has repeatedly said he wants to eventually cover all undocumented immigrants.
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Few issues better demonstrate California’s polar-opposite approach from the Trump administration. While Trump and Republican allies have decried offering services to immigrants as an enticement to illegal immigration, Newsom and other California leaders have called insuring immigrants a moral imperative and a smart fiscal choice.
That hasn’t halted the deluge of negative headlines in conservative media — and Newsom knows it, feeding off that opposition to continue defining his tenure in contrast to Washington.
“To my friends at Fox News, I know we’re keeping you in business and getting your advertising rates and clicks going, but we believe in universal healthcare — universal healthcare is a right,” Newsom said during a budget rally in Sacramento on Monday.
“We’re delivering it regardless of immigration status to everyone up to the age of 26,” Newsom added, saying the goal of universal coverage is “the right thing to do and it’s the fiscally responsible thing to do.”
Within hours, Trump went on the attack. “The Democrats want to treat the illegals with health care and other things better than they treat the citizens of our country,” he told reporters in response to a question about his administration’s push to ask about citizenship on the census.
“You look at what they’re doing in California, how they’re treating people — they don’t treat their people as well as they treat illegal immigrants,” he continued, adding that “we’re going to stop it, but we may need an election to stop it.”
California is counting on the federal government to fund about a quarter of its Medicaid expansion to undocumented immigrants, using money dedicated for emergency and labor and delivery care that is protected under a 1986 law. Trump administration officials last month confirmed that California’s reliance on those federal funds appears to be legal.
Even before Trump’s comments, questions about extending health care to unauthorized immigrants had pervaded the presidential contest. Several Democratic candidates — including Sen. Kamala Harris of California — raised their hands during last week’s debates when asked if their health care plans would include undocumented immigrants.
Both Newsom and Trump have made a habit of deploying the other as a punching bag: Newsom regularly denounces Trump on Twitter, while Trump portrays California’s government as wacky and irresponsible during his stump speeches.
Asked over the weekend about Russian president Vladimir Putin’s critique of “Western-style liberalism,” Trump assailed major West Coast cities: “If you look at what’s happening in Los Angeles, where it’s so sad to look, and what’s happening in San Francisco and a couple of other cities which are run by an extraordinary group of liberal people,” he told reporters in Japan.
California and the Trump administration have squared off in court dozens of times, with California challenging D.C. on issues like environmental regulation, health care and Trump’s state of emergency. The Department of Justice has unsuccessfully challenged California’s so-called “sanctuary” laws curtailing cooperation with federal immigration authorities.