President Biden sent Congress a bill Wednesday that proposes significant changes to immigration policy, including a pathway to citizenship for millions of people who are illegally residing in the United States.
The U.S. Citizenship Act of 2021 would create a new system" to responsibly manage and secure our border, keep our families and communities safe, and better manage migration across the Hemisphere," Biden's transition team said in an announcement Wednesday morning as Biden prepared to be sworn in.
The bill focuses on three aspects of immigration and migration: providing a pathway to citizenship for approximately 11 million illegal immigrants and enhancing labor protections for workers, resolving root causes that prompt millions of Central Americans to flee to the U.S in the past decade.; and putting into place "smart" border controls.
“President Biden’s new vision for immigration reform is extraordinary and a welcome development for America, including the millions of people who are caught up in an outdated immigration system that no longer meets the needs of the nation,” said Jorge Loweree, policy director for immigrant advocacy group American Immigration Council.
Citizenship and labor standards
Illegal immigrants may apply for temporary legal status, which allows them the legal ability to be present and work in the U.S. then apply for a green card after five years. Applicants must undergo a background and criminal check and have paid taxes in order to gain a green card or permanent legal residency. Immigrants within legal programs that protect them from deportation, including the Obama administration's Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, will not have to wait five years to apply for a green card.
The word "alien," used in U.S. laws to describe someone who is not a U.S. citizen, will be changed in all laws to "noncitizen," a move that is meant to change how immigrants are referred to in legal conversations. Alien is a word that immigration restrictionists often use compared to more liberal terms, including undocumented or unauthorized immigrants.
Biden’s bill requires that DHS and the Labor Department establish a commission to study and recommend how to get employers to verify that workers are legally allowed to work in the U.S. It does not indicate if it will back E-Verify, a federal process through which companies can check job applicants' information against a federal system to see if they are hirable.
Application backlogs for employment-based visas will be cleared, unused visas will be added back to the pile of available visas, and per-country caps will be eliminated.
Central American migration
The government will have more authority to investigate and collect intelligence, as outlined under the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act, so that more sanctions can be issued against trafficking and smuggling organizations. The FBI, Drug Enforcement Agency, and DHS will coordinate with the State Department to expand transnational anti-gang task forces throughout Central America.
Biden committed $4 billion across four years to fund an interagency plan to address underlying causes for migration in Central America's Northern Triangle countries, including El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras. Foreign aid to the three countries is meant to reduce corruption, violence, and poverty, all reasons that migrants flee the region for the U.S. and Mexico. The plan creates ways for asylum seekers to request help at Designated Processing Centers in the region to prevent people from traveling thousands of miles to the U.S. southern border and overwhelming border systems.
“A number of the provisions in the bill that could play an important role in the administration’s constructive engagement with Central American countries — including the restoration of the Central American Minors program and the creation of family reunification parole programs — can be achieved even in the absence of legislative reform," Tom Jawetz, vice president of immigration policy at the liberal Center for American Progress, said in a statement.
Previously, illegal immigrants released from detention facilities at the border and into the interior of the country were not eligible to apply for asylum after the fact once a year has passed. That one-year bar will be walked back. The government will cover the costs of legal counsel for immigrant children, people deemed to be vulnerable, and others — immigrants currently do not receive government lawyers as they go through immigration proceedings. The bill states that it will “improve the immigration courts” and expand family case management programs and reduce immigration court backlogs, which top 1 million.
Border security
Throughout the Trump administration, Congress made approximately $1.375 billion available each year for border wall construction, which included technology and roads. Biden’s plan gives more funding to the Department of Homeland Security to acquire technology to inspect cargo, passengers, and vehicles coming through air, land, and sea ports of entry nationwide. The DHS secretary will develop and implement a plan to secure the southern border between official crossing points, where in fiscal year 2019, more than 1 million people illegally crossed from Mexico and were arrested by Border Patrol.
Staffing for DHS’s Office of Professional Responsibility, which handles internal affairs, will increase, and a Border Community Stakeholder Advisory Committee will be stood up to investigate problems among its 80,000 federal law enforcement personnel who work for immigration and border agencies.
DHS will receive funding to create standards for detaining and caring for people in its and the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Refugee Resettlement's custody, including how children, families, and adults are treated. The bill approves changes in funding levels. Presently, HHS takes unaccompanied children into its care after they have been encountered on the border by Border Patrol. Adults and families are transferred to fellow DHS agency Immigration and Customs Enforcement, though families cannot be held in detention for more than 20 days due to a 2015 court ruling to prevent the prolonged detention of children.
“It is heartening to see that it is simultaneously working to tackle problems with the underlying system itself,” said Jawetz.
