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A campaign billboard for Mike Bloomberg, who spent $500 million to win American Samoa in the Democratic primaries for the 2020 presidential election. The territory’s residents are U.S. nationals but not citizens, which makes them ineligible to vote in presidential elections but allows them to participate in presidential primary contests.
A decades-long struggle to end the second-class status of Americans living in the island territories of the United States is gaining momentum as territory leaders make a new push for equity in the social safety net.
With the Biden Administration calling for parity in funding for several social programs in its recent budget proposal, territory officials see an opportunity to achieve equity in programs such as Medicaid, Supplemental Security Income, and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (food stamps). In most U.S. territories, these social programs are applied unequally.
In many cases, the disparities are devastating. With funding often capped, the territories struggle to maintain critical social services during times of crisis, such as economic downturns, climate-related disasters, and the coronavirus pandemic.
“Congress can eradicate structural forms of discrimination in federal programs and end our second-class citizenship in the territories,” Christina Sablan, an official from the Northern Mariana Islands, said in a written statement at a Congressional hearing on July 28. “Congress has a moral imperative to provide parity and make equitable investments in the health and well-being of all Americans, no matter where we live in the nation.”
Nearly four million Americans live in the United States’ five inhabited island territories: Guam, American Samoa, Puerto Rico, the Northern Mariana Islands, and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
The residents of the territories are U.S. citizens, with the exception of the people of American Samoa, who are U.S. nationals (meaning that they can use U.S. passports and travel freely to and from the U.S. mainland, but can’t vote in elections without applying for citizenship). More than 95 percent of the residents of these territories are people of color.
Islanders are severely limited in their ability to participate in the U.S. political system. They have no representation in the Senate. Their delegates in the House of Representatives cannot vote on legislation. Americans living in the territories cannot vote in presidential elections, even though they serve in the U.S. military at higher rates than residents of the states.
The territories are subject to significant inequities in the social safety net. Funding for Medicaid is capped and does not cover all Medicaid costs. Most territories receive reduced support for seniors and people with disabilities. Several territories receive lower funding levels for food stamps.
“We’re talking about really unacceptable disparities in social service spending for our neighbors in the United States territories,” U.S. Representative Rashida Tlaib, Democrat of Michigan, said at the hearing last week.
In many cases, the disparities are devastating. With funding often capped, the territories struggle to maintain critical social services during times of crisis, such as economic downturns, climate-related disasters, and the coronavirus pandemic.
Last fall, the Northern Mariana Islands was forced to slash funding for food assistance because it could not support growing needs as enrollment increased by nearly 50 percent. Congress took about five months to provide additional funding, with the delay leaving about 5,000 families suffering through reductions in food assistance.
“The pain inflicted by the governor’s cuts was excruciating,” Sablan said.
Different rules for the territories often create confusion, especially when U.S. citizens move back and forth between the states and the territories. Several U.S. citizens have lost benefits after moving to the islands.
Leslie and Katrina Schaller, twin sisters who suffer from a debilitating type of muscular dystrophy, received benefits from Supplemental Security Income when they were living under the care of their mother in Pennsylvania. After their mother’s death in 2007, Katrina moved to Guam to receive care from her extended family but was no longer able to continue receiving benefits, even as her twin sister Leslie remained a beneficiary. A judge ruled last year that there was no legal basis for denying these benefits.
Jose Luis Vaello-Madero, who had been receiving benefits from Supplemental Security Income while he was living in New York State, lost his benefits after he moved to Puerto Rico to help care for his wife. Not only did the Social Security Administration stop providing Vaello-Madero with benefits, but it sued him to reclaim the $28,081 that he had initially received after moving to the island.
The U.S. Supreme Court is set to decide whether Vaello-Madero was unfairly denied benefits. Depending on the court’s decision, the provisions of the social safety net could be expanded to include U.S. citizens living in the territories or be preserved to ensure that U.S. citizens such as the Schallers and Vaello-Madero continue to receive second-class treatment.
So far, the Biden Administration has played both sides. In the Vaello-Madero case, the Justice Department is taking a position against equity. In a brief filed to the Supreme Court in June, the Justice Department argued that Congress should retain the power to withhold benefits from U.S. citizens living in the territories.
Yet the Biden Administration has signaled opposition to the unequal application of benefits in the territories. In June, President Joe Biden issued a statement calling current law “inconsistent with my administration’s policies and values.” He asked Congress to amend the law so that residents of Puerto Rico can receive the same benefits as people living in the states.
“There can be no second-class citizens in the United States of America,” the President said.
Representatives of the island territories have played a central role in moving the Biden Administration toward equity. Earlier this year, the five representatives of the island territories began pressuring the Biden Administration to ensure that the federal budget expands access to social programs. They cited an executive order that the President had signed on his first day in office to advance equity and seek opportunities for promoting equity in the budget.
Now that the Biden Administration has presented a budget proposal that calls for matching rates for Medicaid and parity in other social programs, some in the territories see an unprecedented opportunity to move toward equity in the social safety net.
The budget proposal “provides an unprecedented window of opportunity that may never come again,” said Donna Christensen, a former delegate of the U.S. Virgin Islands. “Congress must act this year.”
Others have been more critical, however. They welcome the White House’s call for parity but fear that progress would be temporary and remain susceptible to backsliding at a later date.
“Parity is not a permanent solution,” U.S. Representative Jenniffer González-Colón, the delegate of Puerto Rico, said in a written statement. “Only statehood guarantees equal access to these vital federal programs for the 3.3 million Americans in Puerto Rico.”
Either way, movement toward parity would chip away at the second-class treatment of Americans living in the island territories. It would provide some substance to the executive order that Biden had signed when he first entered the White House.
Now, the big question is whether Congress will act.
“I’ve repeatedly heard the story about the territories not getting the same treatment,” U.S. Representative Grace Napolitano, Democrat of California, remarked at the hearing. “Let’s quit talking about it. Let’s take some action.”