Banks, advocates and landlords debate H.169’s Social Security and immigration provisions at committee hearing

The House Committee on General and Housing continued hearings on H.169, an act to expand prohibitions on discrimination in public accommodations and housing, and heard sharply different perspectives on a provision that references immigration status and the use of Social Security numbers in rental and credit screening.

Chris Delia, president of the Vermont Bankers Association, told the committee he supports passage of H.169 generally but urged removal of the phrase “immigration status” from a section of the bill that banks find problematic. Delia told lawmakers that federal rules and secondary‑market requirements affect how lenders verify identity: quoting regulatory guidance, he said for a “non US person, 1 or more of the following pieces of information, a taxpayer identification number, passport number and country of issuance, alien identification card number” are acceptable alternatives to a Social Security number. He warned that some secondary‑market buyers such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac require lenders to warrant that a mortgage borrower is legally present in the United States, and said that requirement complicates how…