During the past several presidential election cycles, politicians of all stripes have acknowledged that our immigration laws are antiquated and need reform. Unfortunately, for all of their bluster, nothing has been accomplished through Congress. Lacking Congressional action, the President announced earlier this year that he will be issuing executive orders to address some of the problems in the current immigration system.
There are a number of actions the president can take through the Department of Homeland Security that would provide relief for many immigrants already in the U.S. while supporting family unity, promoting economic growth, and ensuring national security through documenting masses of people who are currently undocumented and unknown to our government agencies. One such action is through expanding parole in place (PIP) – a process that is familiar to DHS and the public and is already available to a small number of foreign nationals.
PIP is currently a form of relief available to immigrants who entered the country without authorization but have an immediate relative who has either served or is currently serving in the U.S. armed forces. The process currently involves the immediate relative service member or veteran applying for a parole document on behalf of the foreign national. Once granted, the foreign national receives a parole document that serves as an inspection document without having to leave the country and re-enter. With this parole document – and with an approved or concurrently filed I-130 – the foreign national might be eligible to adjust his/her status by using the parole document as proof of authorized inspection for the purposes of an adjustment of status. Of course, the foreign national still needs to be otherwise qualified to get a green card.
The authority for parole in place comes from INA § 212(d)(5)(A), which allows for the Secretary of Homeland Security to parole in foreign nationals who are seeking admission to the U.S. or who are already unlawfully present in the U.S.
President Obama should expand this system to include all immediate family of U.S. citizens. This would allow foreign nationals who have an immediate U.S. citizen family member who’s only bar of adjustment being their unlawful entry to the U.S. to be eligible for permanent residency. This, like the current PIP process, would not cure any other inadmissibility issues such as criminal activity, but would allow for otherwise law abiding residents of this country to gain legal, documented status.
This action would provide several benefits: providing for a permanent status for people who would be living in the country anyway, ensuring that residing foreign nationals are not separated from their immediate U.S. citizen family member, documenting previously undocumented people, and thus providing information and security for the rest of the populace.
There will be little or no expense to the government for doing this – since most immigration applications have a processing fee that DHS will use for their adjudication.
This action would also have the added benefit of unclogging much of the current immigration system by allowing for a quick and easy process for non-dangerous foreign nationals to gain lawful status and allow for DHS and ICE to spend their limited and currently stretched resources on detaining and removing violent and dangerous persons.
With so many benefits available in expanding PIP, President Obama should direct the Secretary to use his authority under the Immigration and Nationality Act to grant parole to unlawfully present aliens to all foreign nationals with immediate U.S. relatives.
Written by Ally Bolour, Member, AILA Media Advocacy Committee