Washington, D.C. (July 10, 2023) – A Center for Immigration Studies analysis examines a new Biden administration “parole” program, that will allow nationals from four more countries to skip the line to enter the United States ahead of all other green card-eligible aliens, who must wait outside the country for an immigrant visa to become available.

This program, billed as promoting “family reunification” in the United States for aliens living in Colombia, El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras with pending family-based green card applications, is inconsistent with the language and history of the parole statute.

These aliens, with no lawful mechanism to enter the United States, will be eligible to be paroled into the country and receive work authorization under this program. Annual green card issuances are subject to a numerical limit (cap) by statute, and therefore, many beneficiaries wait years to enter the United States as a green card holder. The annual limit for family-based categories depends on the previous year’s immigration levels and is set at a minimum of 226,000 visas.

Elizabeth Jacobs, the Center’s director of regulatory affairs and policy, writes, “Congress, not the Executive Branch, possesses plenary power over immigration under the Constitution. Entry under parole as an alternative to a visa for broad classes of aliens, such as aliens who have family in the United States and may one day be eligible for an immigrant visa, has expressly not been authorized by Congress.”

The parole statute provides DHS with limited authority to parole aliens into the United States, requiring entry to be a “case-by-case” basis for “urgent humanitarian or significant public benefit” reasons.  The new program establishes specific eligibility requirements for participation, which may contradict the case-by-case approach envisioned by the statute. Historically, DHS has construed “urgent humanitarian reasons” as “urgent medical, family, and related needs” and “significant public benefit” as limited to situations as limited to “persons of law enforcement interest such as witnesses to judicial proceedings.”

Jacobs also discusses the Biden administration’s use of this new program to obscure data underlying the mass illegal immigration crisis in the United States.  The new program allows the administration to further reduce the number of aliens apprehended between ports of entry reported by DHS each month, while still allowing large numbers of inadmissible aliens to enter, remain, and work in the United States without a visa. This will create a skewed representation of the true extent of the illegal immigration crisis.