Legislative Bulletin

 

 

Hello y'all,

The National Immigration Forum's Legislative Bulletin for Friday,
October 6, 2023, is now posted.

You can find the online version of the bulletin
here: [link removed]

All the best,

Ally 

**LEGISLATIVE BULLETIN - Friday, October 6, 2023**Welcome to the
National Immigration Forum's weekly bulletin! Every Friday, our policy
team rounds up key developments around immigration policy in Washington
and across the country. The bulletin includes items on the legislative,
executive, and judicial branches, as well as some coverage at the state
and local levels. 

Here's a breakdown of the bulletin's sections:

DEVELOPMENTS IN IMMIGRATION THIS WEEK

BILLS INTRODUCED AND CONSIDERED

LEGISLATIVE FLOOR CALENDAR

UPCOMING HEARINGS AND MARKUPS

GOVERNMENT REPORTS

SPOTLIGHT ON NATIONAL IMMIGRATION FORUM RESOURCES

**DEVELOPMENTS IN IMMIGRATION THIS WEEK**Immigration policy is a dynamic
field subject to constant change. Here, we summarize some of the most
important recent developments in immigration policy on the federal,
legal, state, and local levels. 

Content warning: This section sometimes includes events and information
that can prove disturbing. 

****Federal****

**Congress Averts Shutdown With Clean Continuing Resolution, McCarthy
Ousted From Speakership **On September 30, Congress narrowly averted a
shutdown

by passing a continuing resolution to fund the government and allocate
disaster relief funds - but not to provide assistance to Ukraine in
its ongoing war against Russian invasion. 

The short-term spending bill will keep the federal government open for
around a month and a half, buying lawmakers time to reach a compromise.
After days of trying to attach sweeping immigration and border security
changes to a continuing resolution, House leadership ultimately relented
and advanced a "clean" measure

with bipartisan support. 

But fallout from the weekend led to Rep. Kevin McCarthy's (R-California)
ouster

from the House speakership on Tuesday, when eight Republicans and all
Democrats voted to remove him from his leadership role. The sudden turn
of events has installed Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-North Carolina) as
interim speaker, even as candidates

including Reps. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and Steve Scalise (R-Louisiana) vie
to fill the position long-term.

Before being removed as speaker, McCarthy said his "priority
"
was "America and our borders," threatening to tie funding for Ukraine to
a deal on border security. Sen. Mike Rounds (R- South Dakota) has also
implied

that pairing Ukraine aid with border security could be "the only way" to
get buy-in from a GOP-controlled House, Andrew Desiderio, a reporter for
Punchbowl News, wrote on social media. 

**Biden Administration Announces Border Wall Construction, Resumes
Venezuelan Deportations Amid Increasing Border Encounters **On October
5, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) published a notice

waiving 26 federal laws

- mostly environmental and cultural protections - to more quickly
construct a new section of border wall in rural south Texas. 

Facing criticism for seemingly breaking a campaign promise

not to build "another foot of wall," federal officials including
President Joe Biden

have said the project is part of Congress
's
appropriations requirements, suggesting the administration had no choice
but to comply. 

But in the federal register, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro
Mayorkas struck a different tone when he alluded to "an acute and
immediate need to construct physical barriers" that "prevent" people
from crossing. 

Plans for the new project have engendered swift and widespread rebuke,
with Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Texas) calling the border wall "a 14th
century solution to a 21st century problem."

Meanwhile, the Biden administration also announced Thursday

that it will resume repatriations of Venezuelans to Venezuela, after
authorities there agreed to start accepting returns of their nationals
directly from the U.S. The policy shift comes mere weeks after DHS said
it would extend and redesignate Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for
Venezuelans who had arrived in the U.S. by the end of July, based on a
determination that they could not safely return home amid "enduring
humanitarian, security, political, and environmental conditions."

These aggressive, enforcement-focused policy responses follow initial
reports in CBS News

indicating that migrant encounters at the U.S.-Mexico border increased
once again in September, after significantly declining months earlier.
Apprehensions between official ports of entry reportedly reached around
210,000 last month, eclipsing August's numbers by about 16%. 

Roberto Velasco, Mexico's chief of the North America bureau at the
Mexican Foreign Ministry, told the Dallas Morning News

that large-scale migration at the U.S.-Mexico border will continue until
the U.S. builds out more legal pathways and alleviates root causes of
displacement. 

In the meantime, the El Paso Times reported Tuesday

that Border Patrol's El Paso Sector suffered 148 migrant deaths during
fiscal year 2023 - a record high - many of them during Texas's
scorching summer months. And last week, U.S. Customs and Border
Protection (CBP) released more details

about a 1-month-old baby who died in the Nogales area, after her
16-year-old mother was found softly weeping by a Border Patrol agent. 

Communication barriers between the U.S. official and the child's mother
appeared to contribute to confusion and potential inefficiencies during
the emergency, as the agent said he "was not aware the infant was in
distress" until they got to a Border Patrol station and the mom spoke
with someone else. 

**U.S. Resettles More Than 60,000 Refugees In FY 2023**The U.S.
resettled 8,762 refugees in September, the highest number in any single
month all fiscal year. 

September's impressive resettlement numbers propelled the U.S. to
reach a total of 60,014 refugees resettled in all of FY 2023. The last
time the U.S. resettled more than 50,000 refugees annually was back in
2017.

This is a major accomplishment and a clear sign that the U.S. refugee
program is on the road to recovery. That said, to meet the refugee
ceiling of 125,000 refugees in FY 2024, the U.S. would need to resettle
10,416 refugees every month for twelve consecutive months.

**Biden Administration Expands TPS for Cameroon**On October 6, the Biden
administration announced
it was
extending and redesignating Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for
Cameroon, giving around 2,090 current beneficiaries the opportunity to
keep their immigration relief while expanding potential eligibility to
thousands more. 

Cameroonians who have resided in the U.S. since October 5 may now
qualify, allowing as many as 7,900 new applicants to access deportation
protections and work authorization. 

Ongoing armed conflict that "has resulted in killings, kidnappings,
displacement, and destruction of civilian infrastructure" - as well as
other dire circumstances - has made it so that Cameroonians cannot
safely return home, DHS said
. 

****Legal****

**Texas Continues to Defend Controversial Floating Barrier in Rio Grande
During Appeal**On October 5, Texas attorneys asked the Fifth Circuit
Court of Appeals to let the state keep largebuoys

in the Rio Grande.

The massive floating barriers were designed to block migrants from
wading across the international river. But the Biden administration
argued that the buoys were illegally deployed without required federal
authorization. 

Although the circuit court judges did not indicate when or how they
would rule, one of them appeared skeptical

of Texas's argument that the buoys were meant to only be temporary -
which could work in the federal government's favor. 

Last month, U.S. District Judge David Ezraruled

that the barriers violated federal law and should be removed. But Texas
immediately appealed and was granted astay
,
allowing the state to keep the buoys in place as the case proceeded.  

The 1,000-foot-long barrier was put in place over the summer and has
caused tremendous controversy since, in part by stoking tensions between
the U.S. and Mexico over national sovereignty.

**SCOTUS Declines to Review STEM OPT Challenge **On October 2, 2023,
the United States Supreme Courtdeclined to hear

the case of WashTech v DHS
,
in a victory for international students and the U.S.'s science and
technology fields. The case stems from a lawsuit filed in 2016 by the
Washington Alliance of Technology Workers (WashTech) against the
Department of Homeland Security (DHS), after the department extended

the on-the-job practical training (OPT) period that allows STEM
international students to remain and work in the U.S. after graduation
to 36 months. In its lawsuit, WashTech alleged that DHS did not have the
authority to grant international students OPT, nor to extend it for STEM
graduates.

Last year, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuitupheld

the legality of the OPT program, specifically as it relates to certain
graduating international students. 

In support of DHS's authority to grant and extend OPT, a group of 60
major U.S. companies and organizations filed anamicus brief

in June 2021. Since 1947, OPT hasallowed

international students to gain new professional skills after graduation
and share their talents in the American labor market. 

The Supreme Court's decision not to review the case is good news for
STEM students, educators, and employers. 

****State and Local ****

**Mayor Adams Visits Latin America Amid Increased Migrant Arrivals in
New York**New York City Mayor Eric Adams is on a four-day trip

to Latin America to learn more about what's driving migration at the
U.S.'s southern border. 

Adams will travel to the Darién Gap, a treacherous region that connects
Central America with South America along the Panama-Colombia border. He
also traveled to Mexico City for an international business conference,
and he planned to go to Puebla, Mexico, Quito, Ecuador, and Bogotá,
Colombia. 

The trip follows New York Gov. Kathy Hochul's (D) recent comments

claiming that the border is "too open" and that the asylum seekers
arriving in her state have created a "real problem." 

New York City's inability to properly accommodate those asylum seekers
became an even greater issue when - because of a new city policy to
more quickly push out migrants from government-provided housing -
people were asked to leave their shelters amid a dangerous rainstorm

and flooding. 

"They told me I had to get up and get out," Argenes Cedeño, a
19-year-old from Ecuador, told news outlet The City
. 

Elsewhere in the U.S., Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker (D)
described
the migrant situation in Illinois as "untenable." In a three-page letter
to President Joe Biden, Pritzker wrote, "the welcome and aid Illinois
has been providing to these asylum seekers has not been matched with
support by the federal government." He added that "there is much more
that can and must be done on a federal level to address a national
humanitarian crisis that is currently being shouldered by state and
local governments without support."

**BILLS INTRODUCED AND CONSIDERED**It can be challenging to keep up with
the constant barrage of proposed legislation in Congress. So, every
week, we round up new bills. This list includes federal legislative
proposals that have recently been introduced and that are relevant to
immigration policy. 

Please follow this link

to find new relevant bills, as well as proposed legislation from past
weeks.

**LEGISLATIVE FLOOR CALENDAR**The U.S. Senate and the U.S. House of
Representatives are expected not to be in session Monday, October 9
through Friday, October 13, 2023.

**UPCOMING HEARINGS AND MARKUPS**Here, we round up congressional
hearings and markups happening in the field or in Washington. 

There are no relevant hearings or markups announced yet for the week of
Oct. 9, 2023.

**GOVERNMENT REPORTS**Reports by bodies such as the U.S. Government
Accountability Office, the Congressional Research Service, and the
Department of Homeland Security's Office of Inspector General provide
invaluable information on immigration policy and practice. Here, we give
brief summaries of new immigration-related reports, with links to the
resources themselves in case you want to learn more. 

**DHS Office of Inspector General (OIG);****CBP Accounted for Its
Firearms but Did Not Always Account for Ammunition or Monitor Storage
Facilities**

**; Published September 27, 2023**This report documents shortcomings
with  U.S. Customs and Border Protection's (CBP) firearm and
ammunition storage, control, and accountability practices. "Without
improved controls and oversight of firearms and ammunition," the report
finds, "these sensitive assets could be lost, stolen, or
misappropriated, which could impair CBP's mission and pose a public
safety risk."

**DHS Office of Inspector General (OIG);****Results of Unannounced
Inspections of CBP Holding Facilities in the Laredo Area**

**; Published September 28, 2023**This report covers the results of
unannounced visits to four U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP)
facilities around Laredo in early 2023. Inspectors found that the
facilities "generally met National Standards on Transport, Escort,
Detention, and Search standards for cleanliness, food and beverages,
supplies and hygiene items, bedding, and medical care." However, they
raised concerns around "instances of high time in custody in some Border
Patrol holding facilities," and they noted issues with accurately
tracking people's personal property. 

**DHS Office of Inspector General (OIG);****CBP, ICE, and Secret Service
Did Not Adhere to Privacy Policies or Develop Sufficient Policies Before
Procuring and Using Commercial Telemetry Data**

**; Published September 28, 2023 (REDACTED)**This report concludes that
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and U.S. Immigration and
Customs Enforcement (ICE) - the Department of Homeland Security's
(DHS) immigration enforcement agencies - "did not adhere to
Department privacy policies or develop sufficient policies before
procuring and using commercial telemetry data."

**U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO);****Federal Contracting:
Agencies Can Better Monitor E-Verify Compliance**

**; Published October 3, 2023**This report uncovers inconsistencies in
how government agencies are monitoring whether contractors comply with
E-Verify requirements. It also identifies issues with the process for
disqualifying contractors from government contracts.

**SPOTLIGHT ON NATIONAL IMMIGRATION FORUM RESOURCES**The Forum is
constantly publishing new policy-focused resources that engage with some
of the most topical issues around immigration today. Here are a few that
are particularly relevant this week:

**Fact Sheet: Temporary Protected Status (TPS)**
This
fact sheet explores Temporary Protected Status (TPS), which gives
beneficiaries access to deportation protections and work authorization.
The resource was updated on October 3 with recent developments. 

**The Reasons Behind the Increased Migration from Venezuela, Cuba, and
Nicaragua**
This
paper explores the reasons behind the increased migration from
Venezuela, Cuba, and Nicaragua. While irregular migration from these
three countries ruled by autocratic governments is not new, the
situation has worsened in recent years. Commonalities include domestic
political crises, weakening economies, Covid-19, natural disasters, and
strict U.S.-led economic sanctions. Facing precarious conditions and the
threat of political persecution, a growing number of people from these
nations have opted to seek safety in the United States.

**Explainer: U.S. District Court Judge Hanen Finds New DACA Rule
Unlawful**
This
explainer details the September 13 decision on DACA holding that the
program is unlawful. It also explores the decision's implications for
current DACA recipients and other Dreamers, discusses potential
solutions, and provides a timeline for the court challenge around DACA.

* * *

*This Bulletin is not intended to be comprehensive. Please contact
Alexandra Villarreal, Policy and Advocacy Associate at the National
Immigration Forum, with comments and suggestions of additional items to
be included. Alexandra can be reached at
[email protected]. Thank you.

 

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