CT Can’t Refute Estimate It Spent $1.3B On Illegals In One Year

Just as Elon Musk and DOGE are exposing the federal government’s wasteful spending to the tune of billions of dollars, Connecticut residents deserve a similar audit. Their politicians have sanctimoniously proclaimed Connecticut to be a sanctuary state — while simultaneously admitting they’ve failed to track the costs illegal immigrants impose on taxpayers. The amount likely exceeds a billion dollars, and the problem certainly isn’t limited to Connecticut, which is a microcosm of a nationwide epidemic of prodigal spending on illegal immigrants.

Connecticut’s Office of Policy and Management (OPM), which provides public policy information, admitted that the department has not quantified illegal immigration expenses because a report “would take costly and time-consuming academic research to develop an accurate figure.”

One estimate, compiled by the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), reported that illegal immigration cost the state $1.3 billion in 2023. Meanwhile, between 113,000 and 225,000 migrants who currently live in the state receive services including medical care, in-state tuition, incarceration, legal services, shelter, and welfare.

Gov. Ned Lamont disputed the $1.3 billion number. Connecticut Attorney General William Tong resorted to ad hominem attacks, calling the report a “big fat dishonest, ugly racist, hateful lie.” Yet state leaders cannot produce a number of their own. In truth, the $1.3 billion is entirely plausible, and it is a significant sum of taxpayers’ money.

State lawmakers nonetheless continue to legislate through a veil of ignorance, apparently willing to increase spending without any grasp on the sums currently being expended. Currently, the General Assembly is considering expanding HUSKY Health eligibility regardless of immigration status. On Feb. 24, lawmakers passed emergency bills that provided hundreds of thousands of dollars to organizations that assist people here illegally.

This is no way to run a lemonade stand, much less a state government. Our leaders have an obligation to know how much illegal immigration costs — if for no other reason because it matters to Connecticut’s hard-working families and businesses who must foot the bill. And ultimately, our elected officials answer to us, the people who provide the funds they are spending.

This ignorance about the cost of illegal immigration is particularly galling given that some state leaders are demanding to bust Connecticut’s “fiscal guardrails” — the bipartisan spending reforms passed in 2017 and then unanimously extended in 2023. Put in place to prevent fiscal incontinence, the guardrails are working, reversing decades of pension underfunding and improving the state’s creditworthiness and financial stability. The state has paid down nearly $10 billion in pension debt, enacted the largest income tax cut in state history, and can save $7 billion over the next 25 years if the guardrails are kept intact. 

Whether busting the fiscal guardrails or abetting illegal immigration, politicians in the Constitution State are doubling down on their support for leftist policies (including support for Planned Parenthood and LGBT services) to erect a “firewall” against the White House. This tactic of defying the president, who won a historic victory, is both petty and costly.

In an imperfect world, money and resources are limited. Every dollar that is used to support those who are not here legally is unavailable to provide relief for Connecticut’s legal residents.

Worse yet, state lawmakers are ignoring ways to save taxpayer money without breaking promises to Connecticut’s citizens. State employees have received a 33 percent pay increase through step and annual raises over the past six years. If wages are frozen, Connecticut could save more than $360 million over the next two years. Additionally, lawmakers should reconsider how much state employees pay for their medical expenses — a mere 2 percent, while the national average for state employees is 14 percent. Moreover, the state could also reexamine its film tax credit: The film industry received $112 million in FY 2023.

Even as lawmakers claim they have “earned the opportunity” to evade the limits imposed by the fiscal guardrails, they ignore the fact that Connecticut has a long way to go in its economic recovery. Our state remains one of the worst places to start a business with the third-highest property taxes and one of the worst tax climates in the nation, as well as having one of the highest electricity rates in the country.

What politicians fund is what they value. It speaks volumes that they are seeking to increase funding for illegal immigrants — despite not knowing how much is spent already — while those here legally struggle with high taxes and skyrocketing electric bills.

State lawmakers have the constitutional duty to promote the general welfare of their own citizens first. Right now, the state government is showing a complete lack of respect toward Connecticut’s people by not knowing how much it spends of taxpayers’ hard-earned money on illegal immigrants, whether $1.3 billion, half a billion, or even $1.

It’s impossible to solve a spending problem without knowing its scope. It’s time for Connecticut’s officials to commit to an audit of government spending, implement common sense spending reforms, and honor state and federal law by prioritizing those living here legally.

Carol Platt Liebau is the president of Yankee Institute, a Connecticut-based public policy organization.