US President-elect Joe Biden, on his first day on the job, plans to unveil a sweeping immigration bill that aims to provide an eight-year path to citizenship for an estimated 11 million people living in the country without legal status. The move is a massive reversal from the Trump administration’s harsh immigration policies.
According to immigrant rights activists in communication with the Biden-Harris transition team, this is one of the fastest legitimate pathways for those living without legal status for any measure in recent years. The bill, expected to run into hundreds of pages, fails to include the traditional trade-off of enhanced border security favoured by many from the Republican Party, making passage in a narrowly divided Congress in doubt, AP reported.
Beneficiaries of the bill would include thousands of people with temporary protected status and beneficiaries of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), who came into the US as children. The beneficiaries also include certain front-line essential workers, vast numbers of whom are immigrants.
While campaigning, Biden called Trump’s actions to curb immigration an “unrelenting assault” on American values. Biden said he would strive to “undo the damage,” while continuing to maintain border enforcement. The bill is different in some ways form the immigration overhaul proposed under the Obama regime, where Biden served as Vice President, nor is it as comprehensive. It does not make provision for a robust border security element but rather calls for coming up with strategies. There is no mention of a new guest worker or other visa programs either.
The new bill would make the process to attain citizenship for ‘Dreamers’ and labour who came in to do jobs on farms and would expedite the process of acquiring a green card for those under temporary protective status if they are working, are in school or meet other requirements. As per the bill, people on the fast pathway to attain citizenship must pass background checks, pay taxes and fulfil other basic requirements. After this, it is a three-year path to naturalisation, if they choose to pursue citizenship.
Immigration has been identified as a major issue by Biden allies and some Republican lawmakers, where common ground could be found with Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell and enough other Republican senators to get past the stalemate that has angered lawmakers on both sides.