A federal judge has blocked the Department of Health and Human Services from providing immigration officials access to Medicaid enrollees’ personal information, including home addresses.
District Judge Vince Chhabria, an Obama appointee, issued a preliminary injunction preventing the Department of Homeland Security from using Medicaid data sourced from 20 states that filed a lawsuit to stop the information-sharing.
The order, handed down Tuesday, stops HHS from sharing data on Medicaid enrollees in these states with Immigration and Customs Enforcement for the purpose of targeting migrants for deportation.
“Using CMS data for immigration enforcement threatens to significantly disrupt the operation of Medicaid—a program that Congress has deemed critical for the provision of health coverage to the nation’s most vulnerable residents,” Chhabria wrote.
The judge noted that while there is nothing “categorically unlawful” about DHS collecting data from other agencies for immigration enforcement, ICE has maintained a policy against using Medicaid data for such purposes for 12 years.
The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has long held that patients’ personal information should only be used to operate healthcare programs.
“Given these policies, and given that the various players in the Medicaid system have relied on them, it was incumbent upon the agencies to carry out a reasoned decision-making process before changing them,” Chhabria wrote. “The record in this case strongly suggests that no such process occurred.”
Chhabria said the injunction will remain in effect until HHS provides “reasoned decision-making” for its new policy or until the litigation concludes.
The disclosure of Medicaid data is part of the Trump administration’s broader initiative to provide DHS with more information to locate migrants as part of its mass deportation plan. In May, a federal judge declined to block the Internal Revenue Service from sharing immigrants’ tax data with ICE officials.
“The Trump Administration’s move to use Medicaid data for immigration enforcement upended longstanding policy protections without notice or consideration for the consequences,” California Attorney General Rob Bonta said. “As the President continues to overstep his authority in his inhumane anti-immigrant crusade, this is a clear reminder that he remains bound by the law.”
HHS began sharing the personal information of millions of Medicaid enrollees in June, prompting the lawsuit from the 20 states.
In July, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services signed a new agreement allowing DHS daily access to the personal data of 79 million Medicaid enrollees, including Social Security numbers and home addresses. The agreements were not publicly announced, though HHS maintains that the arrangement is legal.
Medicaid officials had initially tried to block the data transfer but were overruled by senior advisers to Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Although immigrants—both legal and illegal—are generally ineligible for Medicaid, all states are required to offer emergency Medicaid, providing lifesaving care in emergency situations to anyone, including non-U.S. citizens.
“Protecting people’s private health information is vitally important,” Washington State Attorney General Nick Brown said. “And everyone should be able to seek medical care without fear of what the federal government may do with that information.”
Immigration advocates have warned that sharing Medicaid enrollees’ personal data could deter people from seeking emergency medical care for themselves or their children.
