Gov. Gavin Newsom earlier this month signed a bill that ensures undocumented California residents can access a state program that provides discounted home and cell phone services — and protects their information.
Those updates to the California Lifeline Program have gotten the attention of U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, who has asked the Trump administration to investigate whether it “undermines federal law, encourages unlawful entry and misuses taxpayer dollars.”
California Lifeline provides discounted home or cell phone services to eligible households. Eligibility is determined based on a household’s total annual gross income or enrollment in other public assistance programs, including Medi-Cal, Section 8 housing, SNAP, WIC and more. Households have to choose either home or cell phone services, not both.
The application form asked for a Social Security number, which caused confusion about whether households with undocumented residents could apply, said Assemblymember Avelino Valencia, an Anaheim Democrat who spearheaded the changes in the state legislature.
According to a bill analysis, the federal Lifeline program began requiring Social Security numbers in 2012, and California’s program also began to collect them at that time “to maximize the federal support available to California subscribers.”
Valencia’s bill, which passed along party lines before Newsom signed it in early October, specified that a Social Security number is not required to apply for the program.
And it also explicitly prohibits the California Public Utilities Commission, which administers the program, from sharing applicants’ information with other government entities without a court subpoena or warrant.
The idea, supporters said, is to protect undocumented residents’ information from being shared with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement or other federal immigration authorities amid the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.
The updates to the program “will help increase participation for eligible undocumented Californians and ensures they can access essential communication services without fear of unnecessary government overreach,” Valencia said.
But Cruz, a former Republican presidential contender, alleged in a letter to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi that the changes “likely violates federal law.” He called it “the latest in a series of measures by Democrat-run jurisdictions that not only incentivize illegal entry into the United States but also obstruct the lawful operations of federal immigration authorities.”
Cruz asked Bondi and Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr to investigate and “ensure the California law complies with federal law in order to restore transparency and ensure taxpayer dollars are not misused to subsidize and encourage illegal immigration,” according to a news release.
California Lifeline is funded by a surcharge billed and collected by telecommunications carriers.
Cruz, in his letter to Bondi, asked for her to review the bill “and take all actions necessary to uphold our country’s immigration laws.”
And he asked Carr to provide “an assessment of whether state-level telecommunication programs that give benefits to illegal aliens are duplicative of federal benefits and should therefore result in those federal benefits being reduced or eliminated.”
A spokesperson for the Justice Department confirmed receipt of Cruz’s letter but declined to comment further.
Representatives for the FCC could not immediately be reached for comment. Both offices noted that communications with the media are limited during the ongoing federal government shutdown.
In response to Cruz’s letters to Trump administration officials, Valencia said the updates to California’s program do not impact the separate, federal Lifeline Program.
“California’s Lifeline Program has existed for decades to help low-income residents, including seniors, students and working families, afford basic phone service,” Valencia said. “It is a communications safety net, not a giveaway.”
“The law does not rely on state taxpayer dollars and ensures that low-income residents, including survivors of domestic violence, can access essential phone service,” Valencia continued, adding that his bill “also reiterates fundamental legal principles requiring state entities to obtain a warrant before releasing private customer data to any law enforcement agency.”
“Access to communication is not a partisan issue. It is a public safety issue, an education issue and an economic issue,” he said. “People need to be able to call 911 and reach critical services regardless of shifting federal immigration rules.”
Meanwhile, Newsom’s office said the bill is just standard practice to protect people’s information from inappropriate disclosure.
“This bill is part of California’s nation-leading efforts to protect individuals’ personal information,” said Diana Crofts-Pelayo, a spokesperson for Newsom. “We will continue to fight for privacy and consumer protections to ensure personal information is not misused by any organization or against any individual.”
A bill analysis noted California is able to establish its own rules for the state program that differ from the federal program, albeit California is not able to change federal eligibility requirements set by the FCC for the federal program.
It also noted that federal Lifeline subsidies account for $100 million to $150 million annually for California subscribers. “To the extent that this bill enables a larger number of Californians to enroll in and renew participation in Lifeline without (Social Security numbers), this bill may increase the state’s reliance on state-level ratepayer revenues to cover any lost federal subsidies,” it said.
Of note, the Orange County registrar of voters is also at odds with the federal government over the sharing of people’s personal information.
The Justice Department sued Registrar of Voters Bob Page in June for allegedly not providing full records related to the removal of non-citizens from voter registration lists.
Page, county attorneys said, would have violated state and federal law if he had turned over sensitive personal information of voter registrants without a subpoena or court order. Correspondence between representatives for the Justice Department and legal counsel for the registrar’s office showed there was an effort made by the registrar to provide the “sensitive information,” just in a manner that would include “assurances that such sensitive personal identifiers will remain confidential and be used for government purposes only.”
The lawsuit is ongoing.