Biden offered humanitarian protections during a period of record migration. Now Trump is revoking their status.
DHS shuts down CBP One app for immigrant entry, now used to self deport
DHS is changing the CBP One app to help migrants leave the U.S. instead of entering. This follows actions by Trump on migrant entry.
Straight Arrow News
- Trump is rolling back Biden-era immigration programs, including humanitarian parole and Temporary Protected Status, impacting over a million people.
- Immigrant advocates argue that those who entered through these programs followed the rules and are now left vulnerable.
- The situation highlights the complexities and contradictions within US immigration law, where policies can shift drastically between administrations.
Gustavo Garagorry proudly voted for President Donald Trump, even though he knew it could complicate life for relatives who benefitted from Biden-era immigration programs.
The programs were “a disaster” for the country, said Garagorry, who serves as president of Miami’s Venezuelan American Republican Club.
The Biden administration convinced millions of people they were coming legally, he said, when the benefits came with risks in fine print: They could be deported if a different president changed the rules.
“The Democrats are always toying with migrants’ emotions,” said Garagorry, a naturalized U.S. citizen. “But they’ve not done anything but create chaos and make promises they can’t keep.”
Garagorry’s family members are among the roughly 1.5 million people who didn’t sneak over the border or overstay a visa but took a path endorsed by President Joe Biden. They’re a sliver of the nation’s estimated 13.7 million unauthorized immigrants, according to the nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute.
Now that his family members are in danger of losing their legal status, Garagorry doesn’t blame Trump; he blames his predecessor. Biden’s “legal pathways” were underpinned by law but as executive actions could still easily be undone.
Trump is now using his own executive authority to revoke these programs and the legal status of those who participated. Since taking office, Trump has ordered the Department of Homeland Security to:
- transform the CBP One application that allowed 936,000 migrants to make an appointment at a port of entry into the CBP Home, self-deportation app, enabling people to identify themselves as they leave the country;
- cancel the humanitarian parole, or temporary permission to enter the country, offered by the Biden administration to 532,000 Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans;
- and revoke the Temporary Protected Status that covers 540,000 Venezuelans and Haitians, many of whom entered via CBP One or special parole.
The programs were scheduled to begin expiring Monday, with cancelation dates rolling out from this month until the fall. A judge suspended the Monday deadline that would have canceled the status of some 350,000 Venezuelans with TPS.
These immigrants “followed the rules,” said Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, senior fellow at the American Immigration Council, a nonprofit that advocates for pro-immigrant policies. “They entered the country with the formal permission of the U.S. government.”
Stephen Miller, an architect of Trump’s immigration crackdown and a White House advisor, describes the immigrants who arrived during the Biden years as “invading armies and foreign trespassers.”
“If you illegally invaded our country the only ‘process’ you are entitled to is deportation,” he said Tuesday in a post on X.
Regardless of how these immigrants are perceived, they’re caught in a complex system where the law itself is often contradictory and the rules of engagement can change dramatically from one administration ‒ and one day ‒ to the next, experts say.
“This kind of system only makes sense to lawyers,” said Steven Camarota, director of research for the Center for Immigration Studies, which advocates for immigration restrictions. “I mean that in the most pejorative sense possible.”
Biden border crisis: ‘Benefits built on sand’
The nation’s immigration law is called the Immigration and Naturalization Act.
It makes crossing the border between ports of entry illegal – a federal misdemeanor. The law also makes it legal to seek asylum between ports of entry.
The same law allows the president to grant humanitarian parole to people fleeing conflict or persecution. Administrations have used the authority dating back decades, including to welcome 120,000 Vietnamese in the 1970s. The law also says “it should be granted on a case-by-case basis,” said Julia Gelatt, associate director for the U.S. program at the Migration Policy Institute.
Biden offered parole and protected status to millions – on an unprecedented scale – infuriating many Americans who grew frustrated with the sharp rise in immigration.
He was reacting to a historic wave of migration following the COVID-19 pandemic, as the U.S. economy improved faster than others in the region and migrants headed for the U.S., looking for security and jobs. Biden both restricted asylum at the border and created incentives for migrants to schedule an appointment, or apply for a parole program – all in an effort to reduce illegal border crossings.
“The Biden administration pushed the boundaries on the use of humanitarian parole,” Gelatt said. “Each person had an individualized assessment, but I think that reasonable minds could disagree whether these programs followed what Congress meant to achieve.”
A federal court never ruled on whether Biden’s use of parole violated the law, despite Republican claims that it was illegal.
But the programs also worried immigrant advocates and immigration enforcement officials alike. They foresaw complications for those who were allowed in without a guaranteed path to permanent legal status.
“Now the rug is being pulled out from under them,” said Deb Fleischaker, a former ICE acting chief of staff and former career Homeland Security official who served during both the first Trump and the Biden presidencies.
Still, “there were things the Biden administration did that contributed to the political problem that we are in now,” she said.
“All of the restrictions they built were built in cement, and all of the benefits were built on sand,” she said. “The restrictions remain; the benefits disappear; and we are left with a more restrictive system that doesn’t have additional legal pathways.”
Immigration benefits were ‘promises he couldn’t keep’
Garagorry, 58, came to the U.S. from Venezuela 25 years ago, amid his country’s dramatic shift from democracy to authoritarianism. He never returned, he said, not even to visit.
In Miami, he and his wife sought asylum. They married, earned a green card and U.S. citizenship.
After the COVID-19 pandemic, he watched as his native country spiraled deeper into poverty and political violence. The regime of Nicolás Maduro hardened its grip on Venezuela; millions of his people fled, as Garagorry had.
“It’s a pity that so many people arrived looking for an opportunity and fleeing the totalitarian systems and dictatorial regimes that exist in our region,” he said.
But Biden’s immigration programs “were promises he couldn’t keep.”
Analysts say the immigrants who benefitted from parole, who followed the rules at the time, are potential targets in Trump’s immigration crackdown.
These immigrants “may be feeling particularly vulnerable because they gave their information and address to the U.S. government,” said Gelatt, the researcher at Migration Policy Institute. “They could be easy to find.”
It’s unknown how many of those who entered via various temporary legal routes may have applied for or won a more permanent immigration status; the government hasn’t published that data, said Camarota of the Center for Immigration Studies.
Those who haven’t secured another status are removable, he said.
“It is understandable that that person wouldn’t see themselves as illegal,” Camarota said. “Technically, they are not here legally with authorization, but they are also not accruing illegal status.”
Garagorry has been telling his extended family members to get ready, reminding them: “guerra avisada no mata soldados.” Forewarned is forearmed.
Everyone is looking for another path – marriage, a work visa, asylum, he said.
“It makes me sad,” he said, “but what can you do? It’s what’s coming, what the majority decided needed to be done.”
Lauren Villagran at [email protected].