Flap over NY’s $2.1B jobless aid
Illegal-immig, ex-con bid
New York state lawmakers on Thursday were negotiating a $2.1 billion fund that would give unemployment benefits to illegal immigrants and former inmates — possibly providing some recipients with around $28,000.
Legislators and Gov. Cuomo’s office were hashing out details of the “Excluded Worker Fund,” which would be part of the nowoverdue 2021-22 state budget, sources told The Post.
The proposal, introduced in the Senate and Assembly two weeks ago, aims to help residents who are otherwise ineligible for federal aid, such as people living in the country illegally or those recently sprung from jail.
Advocates, pushing for the fund to be closer to $3.5 billion, have stressed that these so-called “excluded workers” were hit hard by the pandemic but didn’t receive stimulus checks or jobless aid.
The proposal would impact an estimated 275,000 workers across the state, including 173,000 in New York City. Some 187,000 undocumented immigrants and 87,000 recently incarcerated people would benefit.
Payments would be calculated to mirror the weekly amounts from federal or state unemployment insurance, or roughly about $500 a week.
Recipients would reap an estimated $12,600 on average, assuming they were unemployed for 24 weeks from the start of the pandemic in March 2020, according to a report by the Fiscal Policy Institute.
“The maximum benefit anyone could receive, if they were unemployed for the entire time covered, would be $28,600 for the first year of the pandemic, March 2020 through March 2021, and $17,500 for April through December of 2021,” FPI found.
Opponents argue that the plan is fiscally irresponsible at a time when the state is hemorrhaging money due to the pandemic.
“This outrageous scheme is the latest in a long line of state government’s misplaced priorities,” Republican State Sen. Daphne Jordan, said in a statement Wednesday.
Jordan, who represents parts of the Hudson Valley and Capital Region, added, “It makes no sense to send billions of taxpayer dollars to illegal immigrants and convicted felons.”
The ongoing discussions over the fund involve requests from Cuomo’s office that people provide documentation about their work and unemployment history in order to qualify, according to sources.
But proponents, including Democratic State Sen. Jessica Ramos of Queens, argue that it would be difficult to get those documents since employers would likely not tell the government they had hired undocumented workers, the sources said.
“We’ve been fighting for farreaching eligibility,” Ramos told The Post about the negotiations on Thursday.
“We want to make sure we are including as many neighbors as possible because too many were excluded from financial-relief programs like unemployment insurance.”
The talks came as Cuomo and lawmakers continued to hammer out the final details of the state’s mammoth $200 billion spending proposal for the next fiscal year — after Albany blew past the April 1 deadline.
Dozens of “excluded workers” have reportedly been on a hunger strike for the last 17 days to push for the fund, leaving advocates steaming over the budget delays.