I followed the data link from Wente's piece. If you look at the graphs you will see that from 2000 to the present the percentage of "native" households receiving social assistance has increased at a faster rate than that of households headed by a non naturalized immigrant. The real truth is that the poor are getting poorer in the US and, as the article correctly points out, it is the poor who are suffering and the rich who are benefitting. Nothing that is happening now will change that. If anything, it will only amplify it.