Judge pauses immigration enforcement from accessing Medicaid data, Fresno immigration attorney responds

FRESNO, Calif. (KSEE/KGPE) – A federal court has temporarily blocked immigration authorities from accessing Medicaid data in California.

The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California granted a preliminary injunction this week, halting access for agencies such as Immigration and Customs Enforcement to personal information, including addresses, for now.

“What it means is that at least for the next 14 days, the federal government, or really Health and Human Services and Medicaid specifically, is blocked from sharing the information,” said Fresno Immigration Attorney George Rios of Cook & Olson.

The ruling follows a lawsuit from 20 states that argued there was no formal decision-making process behind eliminating the long-standing policy that kept certain Medicaid data separate from federal immigration enforcement.

“They just decided, ‘You know what, we’re going to end this,’” Rios said. “And it’s been official policy for well over 10 years that this kind of information was not going to be shared between agencies.”

Rios said sharing the data has created fear among many noncitizens in California.

“There are people who will stop going to the doctor just because they are afraid,” he said. “There are people who will try to unenroll from services they already qualify for.”

GOP Assemblymember David Tangipa, who represents California’s 8th District, called the ruling another example of judicial overreach against the Trump administration’s agenda.

“It’s a ruling that tells pretty much the entire executive branch that they don’t have the right, Homeland Security and a lot of these groups, to access that information,” Tangipa said.

He tells YourCentralValley.com that he expects the case to reach the U.S. Supreme Court.

“It should go to the Supreme Court to settle where are the powers enumerated?,” he said. “To the executive? Or to, potentially, a district judge?”