VA gets flak for using staff to help ICE process illegal immigrant health care despite backlog of veterans .
he Department of Veterans Affairs is getting some flak for helping U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) process health care treatment for illegal immigrants despite a growing backlog of U.S. veterans.
Under the arrangement, which has been around for more than 20 years, ICE pays for the VA’s Financial Service Center (FSC) to process medical claims for ICE’s Health Services Corps (IHSC), as well as other government agencies. IHSC is only responsible for authorizing healthcare services and obtaining providers to deliver the health care.
In fiscal year 2021, FSC processed $74 million worth of claims budgeted by IHSC. The following fiscal year, FSC budgeted more than $94 million in ICE funds, according to a Department of Homeland Security report on “Healthcare Costs for Noncitizens in Detention.”
t comes amid a growing backlog of benefits claims by veterans. As of December 2023, that number stood at 378,000 claims.
The department has attributed the growing number of claims to the PACT Act, which it says accounted for a surge of benefit applications — surpassing previous records by nearly 40%.