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Posted on 07/13/2026 5:56:14 PM PDT by SharpRightTurn
Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) is introducing legislation aimed at shedding light on the financial impact illegal immigration has on America’s healthcare system by requiring hospitals that receive federal healthcare funding to collect and report patients’ immigration status in aggregate form.
Roy’s proposal, titled the Illegal Alien Patient Reporting Act, would require hospitals participating in federal healthcare programs to include an immigration-status question during the patient intake process and submit quarterly reports to the Departments of Health and Human Services (HHS) and Homeland Security (DHS).
The legislation would also make compliance a condition of participating in federal healthcare programs, meaning hospitals that refuse to follow the reporting requirements could lose access to those programs.
“For years, Americans have watched overcrowded emergency rooms, rising healthcare costs, and strained hospital resources while being kept in the dark about the potential billions of taxpayer dollars spent on healthcare for those who are in the country illegally,” Roy told Breitbart News.
“That lack of accountability is unacceptable and absurd,” Roy said. “The Illegal Alien Patient Reporting Act delivers the transparency and accountability Americans deserve by ensuring hospitals report the extent to which illegal aliens are adding to the fiscal burden of our healthcare system.”
Under the legislation, hospitals would ask patients—or their authorized representatives—to identify whether they are:
U.S. citizens or nationals Lawful permanent residents Nonimmigrants Otherwise lawfully present in the United States Not lawfully present in the country Or decline to answer The bill specifies that patients’ answers would not affect their medical care and would not be reported to law enforcement solely based on immigration status. The legislation includes limited exceptions involving certain criminal investigations under existing federal and state law.
Hospitals would also be required to request documentary proof from patients claiming lawful permanent resident status, such as a green card.
Every quarter, participating hospitals would submit aggregate statistics to HHS and DHS showing how many patients fell into each immigration category, how many declined to answer, and how many individuals claiming lawful permanent resident status failed to provide documentation.
Patients classified as “otherwise lawfully present” would include individuals with temporary protected status, asylum, parole, deferred action, withholding of removal, Cuban or Haitian entrant status, Special Immigrant Juvenile Status, or protections under the Convention Against Torture.
The reporting requirements would also identify whether patients who were not lawfully present in the United States were classified as unaccompanied alien children (UACs).
Roy’s legislation would additionally require the HHS secretary to submit an annual report to Congress summarizing the nationwide data collected from hospitals. That report would include estimates of uncompensated healthcare costs associated with illegal aliens, the financial impact on hospitals, effects on healthcare availability, funding needs, and other related information.
The bill expressly states that federal agencies could not require hospitals to disclose patients’ names or other personally identifying information as part of the reporting process.
According to a legislative summary accompanying the bill, Americans have faced crowded emergency rooms and increased pressure on healthcare resources without a comprehensive accounting of the costs associated with treating illegal immigrants.
The summary cites estimates that state and local governments spend at least $21 billion annually on healthcare for illegal immigrants, arguing those costs may have increased following the surge of illegal immigration during the Biden administration.
It also points to Florida’s 2023 law requiring hospitals to collect similar data, which found that taxpayers paid approximately $566 million for healthcare provided to illegal immigrants during 2022.
“Federal taxpayers should be privy to the costs of illegal aliens admitted to hospitals that accept federal healthcare subsidies,” the bill summary states. “American taxpayers ought to know the full scope of how much they pay for illegal aliens’ healthcare costs.”
Several immigration enforcement organizations announced their support for Roy’s legislation.
Grant Newman of the Immigration Accountability Project said the bill would provide long-overdue transparency into the costs of uncompensated care associated with illegal immigration.
The Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) also endorsed the measure, arguing that the legislation would help quantify the financial burden placed on taxpayers following years of mass illegal immigration.
RJ Hauman, president of the National Immigration Center for Enforcement (NICE), praised Roy’s proposal, arguing that the legislation focuses on transparency rather than restricting patient care.
“Congressman Roy’s bill does not touch patient care,” Hauman said. “It simply requires hospitals taking federal dollars to report the data taxpayers deserve to see.”
If enacted, the Illegal Alien Patient Reporting Act would establish the first nationwide reporting system requiring hospitals participating in federal healthcare programs to disclose aggregate immigration-status data while prohibiting the release of patients’ personally identifying information.
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Yes, this.
They come up into San Antonio 55 year old men. No medical history (because they have no medical care) they have a stroke or a leg amputation from diabetes they’ve been sitting on for 15 years and they spend a month in the ICU. Kidney disease from diabetes, repeat strokes. Complications from poor circulation poor wound healing
No documentation not a penny out of their pocket
1.Get total health care costs.
2.Divide that by two.
That should be about right.
Cool. A useful piece of information to have.
How are we doing at just getting hospitals to tell us what to expect for the costs of various treatments *prior* to getting the bills?
It was a Trump I EO, which Biden disregarded. Have people seen the result recently? That would be nice to have as a law too.
They’ll just lie.
And as we’ve come to understand, this requires penalties for failing to attempt to generate truthful records. It’s not really a law if there are no penalties.
“ They’ll just lie.”
Yep. Hospitals full of admin and health care workers adamant on being charitable with other peoples’ money. Tax revenue. Even out of their own pockets. They are so dumb when it comes to economics
A real experience several months ago. I had the need to go to our small low country hospital on a weekend, it was a minor issue. Another person was next to me in a cubicle, which a worker asked him if he spoke English, he answered no. So she made a call on her speaker phone for an interpreter. He gave name, age, address, which he didn’t know. Did he have a job, insurance, “no”. Did he have funds to pay for treatment, “no”. He had a knife wound and wanted to know if it was a fight, which he answered yes. They then asked him if he had a green card or visa, “no”. Then asked him if he entered the U.S. legally, “no”. He was told it would be referred a the U.S. government for payment.
This was a small hosputal and my thought was, this is happening all over the country, hundreds of times a day. It is unsustainable.
Awesome idea, if reported accurately.
No wonder Americans have some of the highest medical costs in the world. We’re paying for our own care and for foreign deadbeats who cannot pay and the hospitals cannot legally turn away (at least that’s my understanding, courtesy of the U.S. Congress).
“No documentation not a penny out of their pocket”.
Doesn’t that really make you want to go into work on Monday morning?
“THE PUBLIC HAS A RIGHT TO KNOW.” Absolutely right. If they are going to tax us for it, they need to tell us how much we are paying on medical treatment for illegals.
In the early 90’s the illegal alien traffic in ER’s in this area was at times heavy but not a problem.
As the 90’s and then the millennium dawned it picked and under Biden it was the worst I'd ever seen. Mexican illegals and every other Latin country and then as time went on Asians, Eastern Europeans. None with any health coverage, little command of English, although the Eastern Euros did better at it than the Latinos and tended not to be as arrogant and entitled as the Latinos. Most likely cowed from decades of the authoritarianism of living in The Warsaw Pact. The Latinos, the Pakistani's and East Indians were beyond insufferable. And We The People are paying for this, all of us. Glad to be out of it.
I worked in three hospital Er’s in thirty years.
The things I saw...
“Awesome idea, if reported accurately.”
I agree. Thank you, Chip Roy. Now let’s see which congress critters try to shoot this proposal down.
It is pathetic that this wasn’t mandated decades ago. Thank the uniparty.
SINCE THE FEDERAL LAWS REQUIRE THAT HOSPITALS TREAT THEM-—EVEN IF THEY CANNOT PAY A PENNY-—
THOSE COSTS GET MELDED INTO THE COSTS AMERICANS GET CHARGED.
A 51 HOUR STAY IN HOSPITAL IN DEC 2025===$194.56 PER HOUR.
NOT KIDDING
“How are we doing at just getting hospitals to tell us what to expect for the costs of various treatments *prior* to getting the bills?”
I haven’t had to have anything done at a hospital in a while and I haven’t heard if the local hospitals are giving costs of services before the services are rendered. That should be required.
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