WASHINGTON: President Joe Biden on Tuesday announced a new effort to provide citizenship to hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants in the U.S. who are married to U.S. citizens, an election-year move that contrasts sharply with Republican rival Donald Trump’s plan for mass deportations.
At a White House event, Biden criticized Trump for separating migrant families at the U.S.-Mexico border and using incendiary language about immigrants in the U.S. illegally, including comments that they were “poisoning the blood of our country.”
“It’s hard to believe it’s being said, but he’s actually saying these things out loud. And it’s outrageous,” Biden said. “I’m not interested in playing politics with the border or immigration. I’m interested in fixing it.”
President Joe Biden will announce a new program Tuesday offering a path to citizenship for some immigrant spouses.
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The new Biden program will be open to an estimated 500,000 spouses who have lived in the U.S. for at least 10 years as of June 17, officials said on Tuesday. Some 50,000 children under age 21 with a U.S.-citizen parent also will be eligible.
Biden, a Democrat seeking a second term in the November 5 presidential election, took office vowing to reverse many of Trump’s restrictive immigration policies. But faced with record levels of migrant arrests at the U.S.-Mexico border, he toughened his approach.
Earlier this month, Biden barred most migrants crossing the U.S.-Mexico border from requesting asylum, a policy that mirrored a similar Trump-era asylum ban and drew criticism from immigration advocates and some Democrats.
Biden’s planned legalization program for spouses of U.S. citizens could reinforce his campaign message that he supports a more humane immigration system and show how he differs from Trump, who has long had a hardline stance on both legal and illegal immigration.
“The Statue of Liberty is not some relic of American history,” Biden said. “It still stands for who we are.”
The program will almost certainly face legal challenges and a future president could attempt to end it. Texas Governor Greg Abbott, a Republican whose state has battled Biden in court over immigration policy, said in a statement that the new effort was “blatantly illegal” and “pandering for votes.”
The U.S. already provides a path to citizenship for immigrants who are married to Americans and entered the country legally on a visa. But in most cases, those who enter illegally must first leave the U.S. for years before being allowed to return legally.
The new program will allow the spouses and their children to apply for permanent residence without traveling abroad, removing a potentially lengthy process and family separation. The administration aims to launch the program in coming months and it remains unclear how long it would take for spouses to obtain permanent residence.
If they are granted permanent residence, they could eventually apply for U.S. citizenship. People who are considered public security threats or who have disqualifying criminal history would not be eligible.
The implementation will roll out in coming months and the majority of likely beneficiaries would be Mexicans, Biden officials said on a call with reporters.
Mexico’s President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador on Tuesday said the decision to regularize Mexican families’ migratory status in the United States is “very good news.”
A little more than half of U.S. voters back deporting all or most immigrants in the U.S. illegally, Reuters/Ipsos polling shows.
At the same time, separate polling by the advocacy group Immigration Hub found 71% of voters in seven election battleground states backed allowing spouses in the U.S. illegally for more than five years to remain.
(REUTERS)
