Many of the illegal aliens are receiving benefits thru their US born children (anchor babies). There are 300,000 to 400,000 anchor babies born each year. They are US citizens by birth entitled to all the privileges and benefits including Medicaid, food stamps, etc.
The illegal aliens use our ERs as free health clinics. 17 states give them in-state tuition for college. The census bureau counts all people including illegal aliens, which has the effect of creating additional Congressional districts. It is estimated that CA has nine more seats in Congress than they would have if just legal voters were counted. Federal benefits are allocated to the states using the population numbers.
"The overall impact of immigration is very large. The 22.5 million non-citizens (both legal and illegal) in the country redistributed nine seats in the House in 2010. Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, North Carolina, Ohio, and Pennsylvania each lost a seat. Florida and New York each gained a seat, Texas gained two seats, and California gained five seats."
Of the 18 seats redistributed by the 40 million immigrants in the country in 2010, 16 went to states that voted for President Obama in 2012. Thus, from a partisan perspective, immigration tends to benefit Democrats.
The redistribution caused by immigration tends to take representation away from states comprised mostly of U.S. citizens and give it to states where a large share of residents are not citizens. In the states that lost seats due to all immigrants in 2010, 96 percent of the voting-age population were citizens in contrast to 86 percent in the states that gained seats.
In the states that lost seats due to all immigrants in 2010, the average district had 543,243 voting-age citizens compared to 449,553 in the states that gained a seat. There is a real tension between large-scale immigration and the principle of "one man, one vote".
he Impact of All Immigrants. Table 4 takes the 40 million immigrants (citizens and non-citizen) in the country and estimates their impact on the distribution of House seats at the time of the last Census. In 2010, the entire immigrant population caused a redistribution of 18 seats. Arkansas, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Virginia, and Wisconsin each lost a seat and Ohio lost two seats. New Jersey and Washington each gained a seat, Florida and Texas each gained two seats, New York gained three seats, and California gained nine seats. Clearly the overall impact is very large. In fact, the actual impact of immigration is a good deal larger because Table 4 does not include any of the children immigrants had after they arrived in the United States.
