Former Department of Homeland Security chief of staff Miles Taylor on Thursday accused the Trump administration of putting assistance for low-income families at risk to pressure states into expanding immigration reporting, after the Justice Department issued a legal opinion covering state participation in two federal welfare programmes.
The Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel issued the opinion on 1 September and announced it publicly the following day. It says that when a state participates in Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, or TANF, and Supplemental Security Income, or SSI, all agencies within that state must report to the Department of Homeland Security people the state knows are not lawfully present in the United States.
