U.S. Supreme Court rules territories not elgible for SSI, attorney not giving up

In a landmark decision with implications for Guam, the Supreme Court of the United States ruled today that Supplemental Security Assistance to low-income disabled, elderly and blind children and adults, does not apply to the territories.

The case involves a Puerto Rican man who lost his SSI benefits when he moved from new york back to Puerto Rico. The 8-to-1 decision, written by Justice Brett Kavanaugh, upheld a law that said that because Puerto Ricans do not pay federal income taxes they don’t qualify for certain benefits such as SSI. The decision has implications for Guam. Local attorney Rodney Jacob had successfully argued a similar case for Katrina Schaller who moved to Guam to be with her sister Kim Fegurgur.

"Kim’s her only relative that can take care of her, so when she moved the United States cut off her SSI and the reason is congress says Guam is not a part of the United States," he said. "As crazy as that sounds, that’s what it says, Guam’s not part of the United States for that particular benefit.

Yesterday unfortunately the 9th Circuit ruled that our District Court has to dismiss Katrina's case because Katrina passed away in October and that decision, the technical word is vacated is what the 9th Circuit said. 

He called the high court ruling “heartbreaking.”

"All this legal mumbo jumbo, doctrines, yeah they’re important and we as lawyers gotta deal with them, but this is a wrong decision," Jacob said. "It's not just, and we’ve gotta do something about it. I don’t know what it is, but I can tell you one thing, we’re not giving up."

There is legislation, currently stalled in Congress, that would extend SSI benefits to the territories. The sponsor, Arizona Congressman Raul Grijalva blasted the decision saying, “it upholds more than a century of discriminatory policies that treat our fellow Americans living in the U.S. territories like second-class citizens.”