LANSING, MI -- Election year politics surrounding illegal immigration and Michigan’s “newcomer rent subsidy” program has sparked a firestorm of outrage in conservative media, linking Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s administration to the influx of migrants at the southern border.
“If you would like to house a migrant in your home in the state of Michigan, Michigan will give you $500 a month,” Dave Bondy, a former journalist turned social media influencer, says in a video posted in late March, a narrative that quickly spread online.
Tudor Dixon, the Republican nominee in the 2022 gubernatorial election, appeared on Fox News to accuse Whitmer of “handing out cash to anyone who will take in unvetted illegal immigrants, undoubtedly risking the safety of our neighborhoods and communities.”
Right-wing publication Breitbart ran with that angle, inaccurately citing MLive’s past coverage of one of those programs.
“I say migrants because not all of them are ‘illegals,’ Bondy clarifies in his video. “Some of them might have a green card or might have something like that, but many of them are illegal.”
But undocumented immigrants who can’t legally reside in the U.S. are not eligible to get the subsidy, and the state never asked Michiganders to set up new arrivals in their own homes — though that did happen in Massachusetts.
“Only people who are legally in the country can receive federal funding under this program,” Department of Labor and Economic Opportunity spokesperson Aundreana Jones-Poole told MLive. “Federal funding is provided to qualified landlords for legal residents who meet the federally mandated eligibility requirements.”
The department declined to provide any officials to speak about the program with MLive.
The subsidy program has a litany of requirements. Applicants must be receiving federal assistance and living under the poverty limit while working or in an employment program. Their landlord must verify they’re a tenant and the migrants must provide a form of identification, though the documents accepted are broad.
The issue has become embroiled in election year politics. Whitmer is a key surrogate for President Joe Biden in Michigan, who remains an unpopular president, while Whitmer’s job approval rating has remained above 50% in polling since her reelection. For Republicans supporting former President Donald Trump, the policy offers a way to tie Whitmer and Michigan to the influx of undocumented immigrants at the southern border.
The alleged killing of Ruby Garcia by Brandon Ortiz-Vite, an undocumented immigrant who had been previously deported from the U.S., placed fresh attention on the issue. Trump appeared at a press conference with law enforcement Tuesday to highlight the topic.
More: ‘Carnage and chaos’: Trump attacks Biden’s border policy after Grand Rapids killing
Senate Majority Leader Winnie Brinks, D-Grand Rapids, called the killing “a tragic instance of domestic violence” and expressed support for immigrants in a statement on social media.
“We know that immigrants (of all statuses) are a net-positive to our economy, public safety, culture and community,” Brinks wrote in the post.
Susan Reed, an attorney and director of the Michigan Immigrant Rights Center, said the rent subsidy program fills an urgently needed void for migrant housing, noting in a statement to MLive “most public benefits programs are limited to people who have held green cards for five years or longer and very few include anyone with a temporary status or a pending application for status.”
Criticism of the program from elected Republicans in Michigan has landed on a finer point: the availability of the subsidy to undocumented migrants who, some assert, are exploiting the country’s overwhelmed immigration courts.
“Gretchen Whitmer’s rent subsidy program makes handouts available to illegals who were caught in the country and then frantically claimed asylum to avoid deportation,” House minority leader Rep. Matt Hall, R-Richland Township, said in a statement. “The Whitmer administration must come clean about this dubious program to the taxpayers who are paying for it. Michiganders shouldn’t have their dollars taken to reward those who broke our immigration laws.”
Hall penned a letter with Rep. Joseph Aragona, R-Clinton Township, to the Office for Global Michigan requesting more information on the subsidies and insisting the program “prioritizes those who have gone through the process correctly,” such as approved refugees.
Hall is opposed to providing subsidies to undocumented immigrants who claim asylum once removal proceedings against them have begun, known as a “defensive” asylum claim. It’s in contrast with an “affirmative” asylum claim, requested upon entering the U.S.
U.S. Rep. Lisa McClain, R-Bruce Township, wrote a letter to Biden asserting the “used by Governor Gretchen Whitmer to provide a rental subsidy up to $500 per month to house illegal immigrants who are claiming asylum status.
At the end of last year, Michigan’s immigration court in Detroit had a backlog of 6,085 asylum cases, according to Syracuse University’s Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse. Nearly 9 out of 10 cases, 5,338, were defensive claims. The average time from the court filing until an asylum hearing, according to TRAC data, was 1,074 days — nearly three years — though delays have declined since 2021.
This has allowed migrants who entered the country illegally to stave off removal and give authorities the slip while they await a decision, critics argue. About 74% of defensive asylum claims are denied in Detroit’s court.
Asylum applicants also need to have received work authorization to apply for the rental subsidy, something they can’t apply for until their application has been pending for 150 days.
The nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute estimated there are 91,000 immigrants in Michigan without authorization, while more than 22,000 refugees have been placed in the state from fiscal year 2013 through 2022.
A February press release called on Michigan residents to work with the Welcome Corps to meet refugees at the airport and assist them with finding housing, employment and enroll children in school. The Welcome Corps program requires would-be sponsors to secure their own funding for the sponsorship.
“The Office of Global Michigan’s goal is to make Michigan the home for opportunity for our immigrant, refugee and ethnic communities,” Poppy Hernandez, Michigan’s chief equity and inclusion officer and director of the Office of Global Michigan said in a statement. “With expanded refugee resettlement pathways, everyday Michiganders can provide refuge and build a state where people are welcomed with open arms.”