IMMIGRANTS ON THE DOLE

The General Accounting Office says immigrants are nearly twice as likely as U.S. citizens to receive welfare. Six percent of all legal immigrants receive welfare compared to 3.4 percent of U.S. citizens, according to the GAO. The study found that immigrants are more likely to be poor and to have more children and elderly people within their households -- all factors that increase the probability of collecting welfare. Rep. Clay Shaw (R-Fla.) has been drafting legislation that will prevent all immigrants from receiving welfare, but the effort was questioned recently by House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.). Today, conservatives repeated calls for cutting benefits for immigrants. "The welfare system cannot serve as a deluxe retirement home for elderly persons from the third world," Robert Rector, a welfare specialist at the Heritage Foundation, told the Associated Press.