State sues feds over health care for infants of immigrants

OLYMPIA — Washington is suing the federal government over a new rule that makes it tougher to get medical coverage for infants born in the U.S. to illegal immigrants.

Gov. Christine Gregoire, a Democrat, said the policy is immoral, adds to the cost of medical care and clearly violates the infants' constitutional rights.

The state sued the Department of Health and Human Services in U.S. District Court in Tacoma on Monday. The government has 60 days to respond.

The government declined comment on pending litigation but defended the new policy.

Gregoire said the agency got advance notice last week and that her social and health services director, Robin Arnold-Williams, was in Washington, D.C., Monday to brief federal officials.

Gregoire, a former three-term Washington attorney general, said the state has a very strong case.

A new federal regulation, recently imposed on an emergency basis and soon to be permanent, requires the state to withhold Medicaid coverage of the newborns until proof of citizenship is processed and approved. A similar requirement exists for adult and child immigrants who seek medical coverage.

Medicaid is a joint federal-state program that covers low-income U.S. citizens. Washington also operates a state-financed program for children of undocumented immigrants.

Gregoire said the rule on newborns makes no sense, because everyone born in the United States is automatically a citizen and the Constitution guarantees them the same services that all other Americans are eligible for.

In the case of the 8,000 infants who are born in Washington every year to poor illegal-immigrant parents, the state picks up the delivery cost and can attest that the children are, indeed, U.S.-born and thus citizens, she said.

The state pays an average of $120 a month to cover the infants.

The task of going through a maze of paperwork to determine citizenship and eligibility does nothing but discriminate against the baby and adds to health-care costs if their parents are forced to use free care at a hospital emergency room, Gregoire said.

"It's a bureaucratic morass, legally wrong and, I absolutely believe from a moral perspective, it's wrong, fundamentally wrong," she told a news conference.

"How in the world can a state discriminate against United States citizens simply because of something their parent is or is not? Let's do the right thing by these children."

Gregoire said the state will ask the court to block the rule in Washington until the issue is resolved at trial. She said she isn't expecting sanctions or penalties because the state is suing.