TL/DR –
U.S. Senate candidate Kari Lake asserted, without evidence, that Democrats are allowing undocumented immigrants to enter the U.S. as part of a plan to increase voter rolls and provide these groups with Medicare and Medicaid benefits. She suggested that the names of these immigrants are being added to voter rolls so that others can vote on their behalf. It’s important to note that such actions would violate federal law and undocumented immigrants are ineligible for Medicaid, Social Security, SNAP, and Medicare, according to a 2022 Congressional Research Service report.
U.S. Senate Candidate Kari Lake’s Accusations on Democrats
Republican U.S. Senate candidate Kari Lake accused Democrats of permitting a flood of undocumented immigrants to cross the border, asserting it to be a nationwide strategy to inflate voter rolls and register immigrants for healthcare benefits. Lake made these claims without offering concrete evidence.
Expressing similar sentiments to the “great replacement theory”, Lake merged allegations of election fraud and welfare fraud during her appearance on Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures” show with Maria Bartiromo. Lake, a former gubernatorial candidate, has frequently used these topics to interpret her 2022 defeat. She is now running for the U.S. Senate seat currently held by U.S. Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, I-Ariz.
The National Republican Senatorial Committee has recommended Lake to concentrate more on issues like inflation and increasing illegal immigrant entries, rather than election denialism.
Lake concurred with Bartiromo’s assertion that Democrats are allowing an influx of immigrants partly to have them “vote for the Democrats”. She cited Democrats’ opposition to a Republican bill requiring proof of citizenship as evidence of this alleged plan.
She further suggested that the immigrants’ names are added to the voter rolls to enable unidentified individuals to vote on their behalf.
Such a scheme would necessitate breaking federal law, a criminal behavior that is claimed despite a consistent lack of evidence.
The nonpartisan Congressional Research Service reaffirmed in a 2022 report that undocumented immigrants, as well as other classes of migrants, are ineligible for Medicaid, Social Security, and SNAP.
In 2023, the nonprofit KFF found in a survey of immigrants that half of “likely undocumented immigrant adults” reported being uninsured compared with 8% of American-born adults.
Lake has put forth similar accusations against Democrats many times, even building on a misleading social media post by billionaire Elon Musk to reiterate her conspiracy theory.
She seized on Musk’s tweet that “no proof of citizenship is required for federal elections” in Arizona, neglecting to mention that no states require proof of citizenship and Arizona is the only state to require it for state-level elections.
The “great replacement theory,” often backed by white nationalists, posits that welcoming immigration policies, particularly those affecting nonwhite migrants, are part of a plot to alter the racial composition of a country and undermine or “replace” the political power and culture of white people.
This theory has been echoed in protests such as the 2017 demonstration in Charlottesville, Virginia, and was cited as motivation for the 2019 massacre in an El Paso Walmart that killed 23 people.
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