MCN Position Statement on HHS Memo: Health Care Access Is a Human Right for Everyone

On July 10, 2025, the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) issued a memo entitled HHS Bans Illegal Aliens from Accessing its Taxpayer-Funded Programs. The notice establishing the revised policy took effect immediately upon publication in the Federal Register on July 13, 2025 and has a 30-day comment period. Since the Clinton Administration, programs like community health centers and Head Start have been excluded from the definition of a “federal benefit,” ensuring that community health centers and Head Start could meet basic public health standards by serving all members of our communities, regardless of immigration status. The recent HHS memo, reclassifies these programs. Additionally, the memo widens the breadth of people who don’t qualify for services, including many with legal status, like H-2A farmworkers, H-1B workers, and DACA recipients. 

The HHS memo threatens to strip immigrant communities, many of them already medically underserved, from access to basic health care, early childhood programs, and critical safety-net services. This is not just a blow to people without authorization to work here; it destabilizes entire health systems, weakens public health protections, and puts children and families at greater risk.

Health care access must never be tied to immigration status. Exclusion increases health system costs for everyone. Keeping people from care when they need it worsens health outcomes, which is more difficult and more expensive to treat. 

We need policies rooted in dignity and equity, not fear. Programs like Head Start and community health centers keep families healthy, children thriving, and communities strong. Health care isn’t just a basic human right; it’s a practical and sensible solution to huge issues that we face like rising health care costs, poor health, and fractured health care access. 

Submit your comment to HHS by August 13! 

Migrant Clinicians Network is submitting comments and we invite you to do the same.
Tell HHS: Our communities deserve access to health care and essential services, regardless of immigration status. This proposed policy will harm children, destabilize health systems, and drive up costs for everyone. We need policies that protect public health, not undermine it.

Make your voice heard. Submit your comment today.

Here’s the link to submit comments:

Federal Register: Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (PRWORA); Interpretation of “Federal Public Benefit”