via massdailynews:
Senate President Karen Spilka plans to include an additional $1 million for the Massachusetts Access to Counsel Initiative in a supplemental spending bill set for release Thursday, WBUR reported.
The program, created in the state’s fiscal year 2026 budget, funds free legal representation for immigrants in deportation proceedings — who, unlike criminal defendants, have no right to a court-appointed attorney.
The additional $1 million would come from the same source as the original $5 million: the so-called millionaires tax, a 4% surtax on Massachusetts incomes above $1 million.
Massachusetts is adding another $1,000,000 to pay lawyers for migrants in deportation cases and that cash is coming straight from the millionaire tax pool, not some abstract fund nobody notices. This program only exists because the state chose to create it in the 2026 budget, it is not required by federal law and immigrants in these cases are not entitled to free attorneys. So this is a policy choice, not some legal obligation they had no control over. People acting like this just “happens” are ignoring the obvious, lawmakers are deciding where money goes and they picked this. Meanwhile regular taxpayers still deal with housing costs, taxes, and services getting stretched thin, but somehow there is always room for another million here. That is the part that is going to piss people off whether they admit it or not.