Washington, D.C. (October 24, 2023) – Two new Center for Immigration Studies reports, based on records obtained through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit, reveal details on the Biden administration’s secretive ‘CBP One’ entry scheme. The data shows that the administration was bringing inadmissible aliens into the United States at land border ports of entry far earlier than is generally known and letting in people of many more nationalities and in far greater numbers than publicly disclosed. The new information raises serious concerns about national security, transparency, and Biden’s immigration policies, particularly the “new lawful pathways” strategy aimed at managing/hiding the surge of illegal aliens crossing the Southwest border.
New Records Unveil Surprising Scope of Secretive ‘CBP One’ Entry Scheme, authored by Todd Bensman, the Center’s senior national security fellow, exposes the true start date and the previously unknown scope of the Biden entry scheme. Contrary to public knowledge, the program began at Southwest land ports 19 months before its public announcement in January 2023. The data shows that the program allowed nearly 250,000 foreign nationals from 97 countries, not merely the four countries advertised, to use the ‘CBP One’ phone app, granting them temporary ‘humanitarian parole’ and releasing them into the U.S. with work authorization for a two-year extendable period.
Shockingly, the Biden administration has accepted Individuals from 24 nations designated by the U.S. government as being of national security concern because Islamic terrorist organizations operate in them. These “special interest aliens” (SIAs) came from countries like Iran, Lebanon, Jordan, Yemen, Egypt, and Afghanistan. The lack of transparency in the vetting process, with 99.7% of all applicants approved for parole, raises serious security concerns.
In a second report,
Thousands of Special Interest Aliens Posing Potential National Security Risks Entering via ‘CBP One’ App, Bensman focuses on the approximately 7,332 SIAs from 24 countries who have been paroled into the country since May 2021. Of particular concern is the administration’s apparent lack of disclosure regarding the vetting process for these entries. James G. Conway, a retired FBI counterterrorism agent, expressed disbelief, “How would you knowingly bring people from terrorist countries into the U.S. with such inadequate vetting?”
“The Center for Immigration Studies should not have been forced to pry this data from our government through litigation. But now we can see why the information was suppressed – they knew this data showing approvals of high-risk immigrant border entries would raise fair questions about whether the government is properly managing national security risks at our southern border,” stated Bensman.
