County- and state-level immigration policies are associated with Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) participation among Latino households

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate the association between county- and state-level immigrant criminalizing and integrating policies and Latino household participation in the largest safety net program against food insecurity in the U.S., the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). Our outcome, county-level proportion of SNAP-participating Latino households, and county-level covariates were obtained from the American Community Survey 1-year county files (N = 675 counties) for 13 years (2007–2019). Our exposures were county-level presence of sanctuary policies and a state-level immigrant friendliness score, created based on 19 immigrant criminalizing and integrating state-level policies obtained from the Urban Institute's State Immigration Policies Resource. We classified every county in the sample as 1) sanctuary policy + immigrant friendly state, 2) sanctuary policy + immigrant unfriendly state, 3) no sanctuary policy + immigrant friendly state, and 4) no sanctuary policy + immigrant unfriendly state. Using multivariable generalized linear models that adjusted for poverty levels and other social composition characteristics of counties, we found that county-level SNAP participation among Latino households was 1.1 percentage-point higher in counties with sanctuary policies (B = 1.12, 95%CI = 0.26–1.98), compared to counties with no sanctuary policies, and 1.6 percentage-point higher in counties with sanctuary policies in immigrant friendly states (B = 1.59, 95%CI = 0.33–2.84), compared to counties with no sanctuary policy in immigrant unfriendly states. Local and state immigration policy, even when unrelated to SNAP eligibility, may influence SNAP participation among Latino households. Jurisdictions which lack sanctuary policies or have more criminalizing and less integrating policies should consider adopting targeted outreach strategies to increase SNAP enrollment among Latino households.