Trump Admin Brings ‘Public Charge Rule’ Back — and America’s Immigration System Finally Makes Sense Again

The Trump administration issued new immigration guidance Tuesday directing federal officers to evaluate whether prospective immigrants are likely to become a public charge or to contribute economically to the United States. Officers are required to assess age, health, family status, assets and finances, education, and skills before making admissibility determinations. It’s a common-sense rule. It’s also the law — and for the first time, it’s actually being enforced.

Daniel Di Martino — a Manhattan Institute fellow, Venezuelan immigrant, and economist who has lived the consequences of socialist immigration policy firsthand — explained the significance: “For over a century, immigrants coming to the United States have been required to prove that they’re not going to depend on the government, something that is eminently reasonable, but no administration until the Trump administration has actually implemented this rule.”

That last line deserves to be read slowly. For over a century, the rule existed. For over a century, it was ignored. The Biden administration didn’t just fail to enforce it — it actively reversed Trump’s first-term version of the rule, signaling to the world that America would accept anyone regardless of whether they could support themselves or would immediately access taxpayer-funded benefits.

Di Martino’s own research estimates the new guidance will save American taxpayers billions of dollars annually by prioritizing immigrants who are net contributors to the economy over those who are net drains on the welfare state.

The underlying principle is the one Milton Friedman articulated in the late 1970s and that remains as true today as when he said it: you cannot simultaneously have a welfare state and open immigration. The 19th-century immigration system worked in part because there was no welfare state to exploit. Immigrants came because America offered the opportunity to build a life through their own effort. Dependency wasn’t an option — and so the people who came were, overwhelmingly, people who could stand on their own two feet.