[2] In addition to the liable to public charge, the act initiated a fifty cent head tax which would be used for bureaucratic processes.
"[9] Historian Douglas Baynton writes that "The 'public charge' provision was intended to encompass people with disabilities more generally and was left to the examining officer's discretion.
[14] Immigration officials may investigate the health, income, wealth, education, and family of applicants for permanent residency to predict whether they will become a public charge in the future.
[15] The term "public charge" appears in the Immigration and Nationality Act, but is not defined by the law.
Refugees, asylum seekers, pregnant women, children, and family members of those serving in the Armed Forces are excluded from the restrictions.
[14] The Trump administration estimates that 58% of households headed by non-citizens use a public welfare program and half use Medicaid.
"[14] The National Immigration Law Center stated that the rule "will have a dire humanitarian impact, forcing some families to forgo critical lifesaving health care and nutrition.
However, public charges remained, but would instead comply inadmissibility statute consistent with the USCIS 1999 Interim Field Guidance rule.
Immigrants who arrived with only twenty-five to forty dollars and with no source of employment were deemed liable to become a public charge.
Competent evidence includes the following; In the early 1900s, The Book of Instructions for the Medical Inspection of Immigrants listed pregnancy (regardless of marital status), and the sexually transmitted diseases syphilis and gonorrhea as grounds for exclusion.
[4] Immigrants who had legally entered the United States but subsequently acquired any ailments that compromised their ability to earn a living were sought for deportation.
Gonzalez did not argue her condition as likely to become a public charge; rather, she challenged the state of Puerto Rican immigrants in America claiming citizenship.