After weeks of deliberation, Congressional Democrats and the White House are scheduled to unveil an immigration bill Thursday that would reform U.S. immigration laws and allow millions of immigrants living in the country to gain legal status, two people familiar with the matter. CBS News.
According to a 66-page summary of the legislation obtained by CBS News, the proposal would create a two-pronged legalization program that would automatically allow agricultural workers, temporary protected status (TPS) holders and undocumented immigrants coming to the U.S. to qualify as children. green cards. After three years, they were able to apply to become a US citizen.
All other eligible unauthorized immigrants would be able to apply for temporary deportation assistance and work permits while being placed on an eight-year path to U.S. citizenship. Applicants would all have to undergo background and national security checks, as well as file taxes and pay application fees.
According to the draft that was shared with Congress staff, the plan would not benefit newcomers as all potential applicants would be required to prove they were in the US before January 1, 2021. The Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) would have been authorized to issue humanitarian waivers from this requirement for immigrants deported during the Trump administration, provided they prove that they were in the US for at least three years before their deportation lived.
California congressman Linda Sánchez and New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez, two Democrats with experience in drafting immigration policy, will introduce the proposal in the House and Senate respectively.
The account, based on parameters disclosed by the Biden administration last month, is expected to be defended by the White House as one of President Biden’s domestic policy priorities during his first year in office. However, the sweeping proposal must gain unanimous Democratic support and at least 10 Republican votes in the Senate under current Senate rules – a threshold that has previously doomed other immigration reform plans.
John Moore / Getty Images
In addition to the legalization provisions, the bill would remove Clinton-era sanctions that prohibit undocumented immigrants leaving the US from entering the country for three or ten years, and would increase the power of the president to issue categorical bans. issue to groups of immigrants. It would also replace all references to “foreigner” in immigration laws with the term “non-citizen”.
Another centerpiece of the bill is an extension of legal immigration. The plan would increase current country-by-country limits for family and work-related immigrant visas and reassign unused visas. It would make spouses and children of green card holders ‘immediate family members’, exempting them from the country cap.
The bill would increase the annual allocation of employment-based visas from 140,000 to 170,000, as well as the annual ceiling for diversity visas from 55,000 to 80,000. An additional 10,000 visas would be set aside for a pilot immigrant program that will contribute to the economic development of local communities.
The plan would give the Biden government $ 1 billion annually between 2022 and 2025 to fund efforts to reduce the violence, poverty, crime, and corruption that fuel U.S. migration from Central America. It would also require the establishment of processing centers in the region where Central Americans, including children at risk, could apply for parole or refugee status to enter the US legally.
Other provisions call for DHS to implement “smart” border security measures and allocate resources to expand the infrastructure that ports of entry have to process asylum seekers and intercept illegal drugs. The department should issue new guidelines for the care and processing of migrant children.
The plan would also grant 30,000 visas to victims of serious crimes who support law enforcement; scrapping the current 1-year deadline for asylum seekers to apply for refuge in the US; and instruct DHS to expand alternatives to detention for migrants in deportation proceedings, especially families with children.