TOOLKIT
Provider Education: Patient & Provider Rights
It critical that frontline providers know their rights and their patients' rights.
Knowing the limits of law enforcement's power will help us better protect our patients, their communities, and ourselves. Below is a brief summary of the ways the law protects us and the ways we are vulnerable, and resources to help us understand patient and provider rights.
Protections:
1) The 4th Amendment still protects people against unreasonable search and seizure. This limits the power of law and immigration enforcement.
2) A 2011 policy limited ICE and CBP immigration enforcement actions at sensitive locations, including all health care facilities.
The sensitive locations policy has been superseded by a Protected areas policy that provides clarifications about the health facilities that are protected:
A Protected Area is a medical or mental healthcare facility, such as a hospital, doctor’s office, health clinic, vaccination or testing site, urgent care center, site that serves pregnant individuals, or community health center.
3) Warrants or consent are required for disclosure of information or for entering a private area, including areas within a health care facility designated as 'private.'
4) Everyone has the right to remain silent.
Vulnerabilities:
1) The 4th Amendment does NOT protect against "reasonable" searches. 'Reasonable' is determined by the subjective and objective expectation of privacy.
2) Clinic areas that are seen as public are subject to law enforcement presence without a warrant or consent. In these areas, they can question anyone, but everyone can remain silent.
3) Law enforcement CAN search private areas if they have "probable cause" to suspect past, present, or future unlawful activity.
4) Anything that is in "plain view" or "plain hearing" in a public area is fair game.
5) Consent exception presents a risk because agents will believe/say that they have consent unless staff is clear that they do not consent
6) Agents can engage in enforcement at protected areas with prior approval from leadership or under exigent circumstances. Note that a new administration could substantially weaken or abandon the protected areas policy
7) As of December 2024 it appears the incoming administration is planning to end the "sensitive locations/protected areas" policies. More information is available here; the link also includes advocacy actions.
Healthcare, Immigrants and Legal Protections
National Immigration Law Center (NILC)
Webinar: Protecting Your Immigrant Patients' Access To Health Care (April 24, 2017)
Powerpoint slides from an excellent NILC webinar overview of some basics, the current landscape, legal rights, and how to create safe spaces.
National Immigration Law Center (NILC)
Know Your Rights, Know Your Patients' Rights (2024)
Information for health care providers on how to prepare for and respond to enforcement actions by immigration officials and interactions with law enforcement. Originally published in April 2017, updated in 2024.
Coordinating with Attorneys to Advance Care for Immigrant Patients
Tipsheet offering practical knowledge to those coordinating with attorneys and writing letters
of support for their immigrant patients.