An Immigration Reform Agenda for the 119th Congress

Report by FAIR’s Government Relations Staff | December 2024 | View Full Report (PDF)
FAIR is the nation’s oldest and largest public interest organization of concerned individuals who believe that our immigration laws must be reformed to better serve the needs of current and future generations. Founded in 1979, FAIR works for policies that put the interests of Americans ahead of corporate and special interests. For over four decades, we have offered and advocated for solutions that help reduce the harmful impact of uncontrolled immigration on the economy, national security, health care, education, the environment, and the rule of law.
With 45 years of experience, FAIR is a highly respected voice and a reliable source of information on the issue of immigration. By providing expertise, research, and counsel to lawmakers and their staff, FAIR’s government relations team has played a significant role in virtually all major immigration policy changes since its inception. In addition, FAIR spokespersons are routinely interviewed by major news networks, radio talk shows, and the print media about all aspects of the immigration debate.
In all we do, FAIR’s goal is to educate and increase public awareness of immigration issues, present solutions, and ensure that the public’s voice is heard. FAIR has over 3 million members and supporters nationwide. Our membership is nonpartisan and diverse, representing people from all communities, political persuasions, and socioeconomic levels.
FAIR presents this Immigration Reform Agenda for the 119th Congress as a guide for ending illegal immigration, reducing legal immigration to a more sustainable level, and lessening the impact of mass immigration on all aspects of society—thereby lifting the burden on the American taxpayer and improving our quality of life.
We look forward to working with you throughout the 119th Congress.
Introduction
Illegal immigration and unchecked legal immigration are detrimental to the quality of life in the United States. Over the last four years, record numbers of illegal aliens have flooded into the country because of the Biden-Harris administration’s open-borders, anti-enforcement policies that failed at every level to protect the interests of American citizens. Americans across the country have increasingly been forced to bear the costs of illegal alien crime, an overburdened health care system, overwhelmed public schools, environmental degradation, and debt-ridden state and local governments—all results of uncontrolled immigration.
The fiscal costs of immigration, illegal and legal, have always been substantial, but after four years of failed immigration policies and record illegal immigration, these costs have become an even greater burden on American taxpayers. In 2023, FAIR estimated the net cost of illegal immigration to be a staggering $150.7 billion annually.[1]These costs range from emergency medical care to in-state tuition; from incarcerating illegal aliens in local jails to federal budgets that pay out billions in public benefits every year.
Our country’s immigration policies will determine the kind of America that future generations will inherit—livable or overcrowded, successful or overburdened, grounded in the rule of law or lawless. The 119th Congress must make it a priority to roll back the harmful policies of the past four years and instead take decisive action to restore our borders and ensure that our immigration laws are respected and enforced. The following report offers a comprehensive legislative agenda aimed at strengthening our immigration system and putting American interests at the forefront of immigration policy.
Within FAIR’s Legislative Agenda, there are four major areas of true immigration reform: (1) national security and border control; (2) immigration enforcement; (3) reforming legal immigration and protecting the American worker; and (4) defending voting integrity. While the recommendations are by no means exhaustive, they do represent major reforms that FAIR considers to be top priorities and the most effective solutions for addressing the immigration crisis in the United States.
National Security and Border Control
Over the last four years, our country’s national security and public safety have become an afterthought. The Biden-Harris administration threw open our borders and rolled back effective policies proven to discourage illegal immigration. As a result, unprecedented numbers of illegal aliens – including suspected terrorists, traffickers, and cartel members – have poured into the country, sometimes completely undetected by border agents.
Some Members of Congress understood the gravity of the situation and took steps during the 118th Congress to reverse course. Most importantly, in May 2023, the House of Representatives passed H.R. 2, the Secure the Border Act.[2] This FAIR-supported bill offered comprehensive policy changes to secure our borders and enforce our immigration laws, but ultimately stalled in the Senate. In the coming Congress, the key provisions in H.R. 2 must be enacted into law, along with other meaningful policy reforms. Some of the most critical reforms in H.R. 2 include:
- Requiring the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to restart border wall construction.
- Significantly limiting the ability of border agents to release illegal aliens into the U.S. and strengthening our ability to detain and deport those aliens.
- Reinstating the Remain in Mexico policy.
- Reforming our asylum process to deter frivolous claims and prohibit gang members, felons and drunk drivers from benefitting from our asylum system.
- Preventing unaccompanied alien children surges at the border in a humanitarian way, enabling them to be processed expeditiously with family members and sent home.
- Significantly limiting the government’s authority to grant humanitarian parole, so that broad, category-based parole programs cannot be established to circumvent Congress.
Border Security
The last four years have broken records in the worst way. Since the Biden-Harris administration took office, nearly 11 million illegal aliens have been encountered at our borders, with Fiscal Year (FY) 2023 boasting the highest number of encounters ever recorded in a single fiscal year—more than 3.2 million.[3] Perhaps most concerning, this administration has seen roughly two million known “gotaways,” illegal border-crossers who entirely evaded border agents to slip into the country.[4]
Among the historic number of encounters were record numbers of convicted criminals. Since FY 2021, more than 170,000 illegal aliens with criminal warrants or convictions were encountered at our borders.[5] That number included more than 4,800 illegal aliens convicted of assault, battery, or domestic violence, along with over 3,300 convicted of theft-related offenses, nearly 1,400 convicted of sexual offenses, and almost 200 convicted of homicide or manslaughter.[6] All of these represent dramatic increases over the previous four fiscal years. In addition, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) apprehended nearly 400 suspected terrorists attempting to cross into the country illegally between ports of entry, along with another 1,587 at ports of entry, and more than 1.7 million special interest aliens potentially posing national security threats.[7]
Rather than detaining illegal aliens apprehended at the border, the Biden-Harris administration ignored the law and implemented catch-and-release policies to release millions of illegal aliens into the country. Under this administration, it became routine for illegal aliens encountered at the border to be released on their own recognizance with a Notice to Appear (NTA), which requires them to report for a court date, often years in the future. During the first year of the administration, illegal aliens were being released with a Notice to Report (NTR), which incredibly did not require them to appear in court, but only that they self-report to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) office within 60 days. And, most illegal aliens encountered at our borders over the past four years were not removed. According to the House Judiciary Committee, “[o]f the nearly 6 million illegal alien encounters [at the southern border] from January 20, 2021, through September 30, 2023, at least 3,095,577 illegal aliens had no confirmed departure from the United States as of September 30, 2023.”[8]
National security and public safety threats to Americans stemming from the border have never been higher. Heading into the 119th Congress, FAIR recommends the following measures to restore order to our borders:
- Immediately restart border wall construction, ensuring that the wall is built along no less than 900 miles of our southern border.
- Significantly increase Border Patrol manpower and ensure that Border Patrol agents work the front lines rather than process and release illegal aliens.
- Provide additional technology at border ports of entry to detect and prevent the entry of narcotics, contraband, and illegal aliens.
- Expand the use of expedited removal and limit the government’s ability to release aliens upon apprehension at the border by strengthening the law to mandatorily detain, return, and remove illegal aliens under Section 235, including by applying expedited removal to aliens present without admission per 212(a)(6)(A).[9]
- Give the DHS Secretary the authority to turn away aliens without valid entry documents if doing so is necessary to maintain operational control of the border.
- Limit the use of the CBP One mobile application to inspection of perishable cargo only (as the app was originally intended), banning it from being used to facilitate entry for illegal aliens.
Ensuring United Families at the Border
The Flores Settlement Agreement, which has given rise to a myriad of problems regarding unaccompanied alien children (UACs), also created a massive incentive for fraudulent family units to enter the country illegally. In 2015, a federal judge interpreted the Flores Settlement to mean that alien children in family units cannot be detained for longer than 20 days.[10] As a result, parents arriving with children are more likely to be released quickly into the country alongside their child, giving rise to using children as a fast pass into the country.
Human smugglers have learned to exploit Flores to create fraudulent families—a lucrative business model that has resulted in untold harm. Illegal aliens pay smugglers to provide children to accompany them across the border. After the fraudulent family unit is released into the country, the child is returned to the smugglers who then assign the children to cross with another group.
Without legal requirements that border agents verify familial relationships at the border and closing loopholes fostering fraud, children will continue to be exploited. FAIR recommends the following policy changes to ensure those children are protected:
- Reverse the judicially imposed restrictions on the detention of unaccompanied and accompanied minors that have led to unsustainable catch-and-release practices.
- Implement DNA testing at the border to verify familial relationships and prevent human trafficking.
- Significantly expand family detention space and detain families together.
Asylum Reform
It is too easy to claim asylum in the United States, which has led to fraud and abuse. Politically motivated regulations, policies, and legal opinions have whittled away once bright-line rules regarding the ultimate basis for asylum: past persecution or fear of future persecution based on race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group, or political opinion. Over time, these categories for asylum have been extended beyond their original scope to cover people never intended to qualify for asylum and to cover actions that do not meet the definition of persecution.
The burden for obtaining asylum is also relatively low. In general, an applicant will qualify for asylum if he has suffered past persecution or if he has a well-founded fear of future persecution.[11] However, the Supreme Court has interpreted this “well-founded fear” standard to mean that an alien is not required to show persecution is more likely than not to occur (i.e., more than a 50 percent chance) and has even implied that merely establishing that there is only a 10 percent chance that persecution will occur is sufficient to meet the burden.[12]
Finally, the initial screening process for asylum seekers at the border is too lenient. This has resulted in the referral of huge numbers of weak asylum cases to our immigration courts, creating an enormous backlog and incentivizing mass fraud. Data for FY 2023 shows that 60 percent of aliens who claimed asylum at the border passed their initial credible fear screening.[13] Yet only 64 percent of that group actually filed asylum applications in immigration court (per the standard process), and only 18 percent of the aliens who filed asylum applications in immigration court were granted asylum.[14]
To pass a credible fear screening interview, an alien must only show that there is a “significant possibility” that the alien can, before a judge, establish past persecution or a well-founded fear of future persecution under one of the accepted grounds.[15] As interpreted by government agencies, the significant possibility standard does not require the alien to show it is more likely than not that the applicant can meet their asylum burden in immigration court. Instead, the standard merely requires the applicant to establish “a substantial and realistic possibility of succeeding” on his asylum claim.[16] And, as stated above, successfully establishing an asylum claim requires showing only a 10 percent chance that persecution will occur.
The American people have every right to put reasonable limitations on asylum in order to weed out fraud and reserve this humanitarian benefit for those most in need. While federal asylum law allows aliens physically present in the United States to claim asylum, it also says such claims must be made in accordance with federal rules and regulations. Moreover, under the U.S. asylum system, a grant of asylum is wholly a discretionary decision by the U.S. government. That means, an alien may satisfy all of the requirements of the asylum statute and the government may still decide, as a matter of discretion, not to grant asylum to that particular alien.
The Biden-Harris administration only exacerbated these problems in our asylum system. It reversed legal opinions by the Attorney General to broaden the grounds for claiming asylum.[17] Then, it ignored the law and decided to release virtually all aliens claiming asylum – at times, even before a credible fear hearing had occurred. It even amended the regulations to permit the parole of aliens claiming asylum.[18] Then, as if it intended to get the problem under control, it adopted a regulation that put some restrictions on claiming asylum between ports of entry, while continuing to let asylum-seekers in, unfettered, through the ports of entry.[19] This overall scheme was only reinforced by President Biden’s executive action in June 2024.[20]
As a result of President Biden’s asylum policies, encounters at our ports of entry have skyrocketed. In early FY 2021, only about 20,000 people entered at ports of entry each month.[21]But by the end of FY 2022, encounters at ports of entry had more than tripled; by the end of FY 2023, encounters at ports of entry increased by 500%.[22] In August 2024 alone, nearly 100,000 illegal aliens were encountered at our ports of entry.[23]
Ultimately, the Biden-Harris administration was never willing to break from the open-borders advocates to recommend and implement meaningful policy reforms that will get our asylum system under control and restore it to its original purpose. This failure in leadership has resulted in hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens being released into the country after simply making an asylum claim and basically guaranteed that illegal aliens will stay in the country for years before their cases are adjudicated. The current asylum case backlog stands at more than 1.1 million cases, while the total immigration court case backlog exceeds 3.7 million cases.[24] More than 350,000 asylum cases have been quietly dismissed since the start of the Biden-Harris administration.[25]
To make matters worse, the Biden-Harris administration has dramatically increased the issuance of employment authorization documents (EADs) to illegal aliens, including asylum seekers. In FY 2023 alone, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) completed more than 3.4 million EAD applications – including for asylum seekers, refugees, parolees, and Temporary Protected Status (TPS) beneficiaries – residing in the United States.[26] FY 2021 saw more than 1.6 million work permits issued (compared to 161,811 denied) and FY 2022 saw more than 2.1 million permits issued (compared to 259,714 denied).[27] Of the 3.4 million work permit applications completed in FY 2023, more than 1.2 million were for aliens with pending asylum applications.[28]
Congress must act to restore order to our asylum system through closing loopholes, disincentivizing fraudulent asylum claims, and reducing the immigration court case backlog. FAIR recommends the following reforms:
- Raise the standard to establish credible fear under 235(b)(1)(B)(v) to deter and screen out fraudulent asylum claims.[29]
- Require all aliens claiming asylum to arrive at a designated port of entry under 208(a)(1).[30]
- Detain asylum-seekers, as required by law, pending the full adjudication of their cases.
- Bar parole for asylum-seekers.
- Apply all mandatory bars to asylum under 208(a)(2) and 208(b)(2)(A) during credible fear screenings.[31]
- Ensure that the safe third country bar can be properly enforced by striking “pursuant to a bilateral or multilateral agreement” under 208(a)(2)(A) and barring asylum if the alien transited at least one safe third country without applying for protection.[32]
- Define the firm resettlement bar under 208(b)(2)(A)(vi) to include any countries that aliens resided in prior to entering the United States and in which any permanent, or indefinitely renewable, immigration status was available to said aliens.[33]
- Require asylum claimants to prove the existence of a “particular social group” under 101(a)(42)(A) outside of the alleged persecution and establish that their membership in said group is not based on criminal or terroristic activity.[34]
- Clarify that “persecution” does not mean generalized harm or violence; is not open-ended to include any treatment which the United States disagrees with; threats without action to carry out those threats; or intermittent harassment.
- Prohibit asylum for aliens convicted of felonies, DUIs, and other serious criminal offenses.
Immigration Parole Reform
Under Section 212(d)(5) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, the DHS Secretary is authorized to grant parole to foreign nationals who otherwise do not have legal permission to enter the United States. Congress intended for parole to be used on a case-by-case basis in exceptional circumstances to allow certain nationals a temporary stay in the country for urgent humanitarian reasons or significant public benefit.[35] Examples of this may include seeking urgent medical care, attending a funeral, or testifying in a court case.
The Biden-Harris administration has employed parole to allow in huge numbers of illegal aliens, including: 1) at the border, upon encounter, allowing the alien to be released to eventually claim asylum; 2) at southern border ports of entry, using the CBP One app to schedule appointments and be evaluated and released by CBP; and 3) through categorical, or nation-based, parole programs whereby foreign nationals fly into the United States. All of them are unlawful.
Over the past four years, parole was granted so broadly that it surpassed the scale of our legal immigration system. In FY 2023, the Biden-Harris administration granted over 1.3 million aliens parole, but only granted a little over 1.1 million green cards—a difference of over 160,000.[36] Moreover, many of the administration’s parole programs were designed specifically to allow parolees to apply for legal permanent residence. Thus, rather than providing temporary relief under discrete circumstances, parole has become a backdoor for huge numbers of illegal aliens to enter and remain permanently in the United States. This has turned parole into a blank check for open-borders administrations to let in millions of illegal aliens, working as a quasi-amnesty program with no limits.
The Cuba-Haiti-Nicaragua-Venezuela (CHNV) program – the Biden-Harris administration’s largest categorical parole program – has paroled in more than 531,000 illegal aliens alone, and per multiple reports, is rife with fraud.[37] According to an internal agency review conducted by USCIS, evidence of that fraud includes the use of fake Social Security numbers (SSNs), including SSNs of deceased individuals, and the use of false phone numbers.[38] Many applications listed the same physical address.[39] In fact, 100 addresses were associated with over 19,000 forms, and many parole applicants applied from a single property (including a mobile park home, warehouse, and storage unit).[40] In addition, many applications were submitted by the same IP address.[41] If this were not bad enough, the same exact answers to questions were provided on hundreds of applications – in some instances, the same answer was used by over 10,000 applicants.[42]
In June 2024, the Biden-Harris administration further abused the parole authority by creating a mass parole-in-place program for hundreds of thousands of illegal alien spouses and stepchildren of American citizens living in the U.S. for ten years or more.[43] Not only is parole-in-place a concept created out of thin air without the consent of Congress, it encourages mass illegal immigration by creating the expectation that those who enter illegally will eventually be given a parole-based amnesty.
The incoming Congress must act quickly to end this abuse so that parole is used as originally intended under future administrations. FAIR recommends the following measures:
- Significantly limit the government’s authority to grant parole and limit the number of paroles that may be granted per year so that broad, category-based parole programs cannot be established to circumvent the immigration programs established by Congress.
- Eliminate the possibility of parole-in-place by clarifying in statute that parole may only be granted to arriving aliens, not aliens in the interior of the U.S. This change is critical to preventing presidential administrations from bypassing Congress to grant amnesty to large populations of illegal aliens.
- Require that parole be individually determined, based on strict new definitions of “significant public benefit” and “urgent humanitarian reasons.”
- Limit parole to one year and prohibit the ability of those on parole to work, with limited exceptions.
Defunding Open-Borders Organizations
Instead of securing our borders and detaining and deporting illegal aliens, the Biden-Harris administration has released illegal aliens en masse, and provided them with shelter, food, medical care, and transportation across the country through the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s (FEMA) Shelter and Services Program (SSP).[44]The SSP program provides grants to non-governmental organizations (NGOs), states, and local jurisdictions to fund services for illegal aliens.
In December 2022, Congress appropriated hundreds of millions of dollars to establish and support SSP through the Consolidated Appropriations Act of FY 2023.[45] More specifically, the act allocated $800 million towards FEMA to “support sheltering and related activities provided by non-Federal entities, including facility improvements and construction, in support of relieving overcrowding in short-term holding facilities of U.S. Customs and Border Protection.”[46] According to FEMA, about $364 million of that total went to SSP and another $333 million went to its predecessor program, the Emergency Food and Shelter Program-Humanitarian (EFSP-H), which was in the process of being phased out.[47] In the FY 2024 appropriations package, passed in March 2024, $650 million was allocated to SSP.[48]
Similarly, international organizations, including the United Nations, have increasingly provided generous support for migrants traveling to the United States. Of particular concern, the Department of State has set up Safe Mobility Offices (SMOs) that coordinate with the United Nations to “fast-track” migrants into the country. The Biden-Harris administration created these offices based on the pretext that they would eliminate the need for migrants to make the dangerous journey to the U.S.-Mexico border, but they are instead simply facilitating that journey. According to the House Judiciary Committee: “UNHCR has spent $67.1 million of U.S. taxpayer funding on SMOs, with [the International Organization for Migration] devoting another $14.6 million of U.S. taxpayer funding to the initiative, totaling more than $80 million between UNHCR and IOM.”[49]
Instead of subsidizing mass migration and forcing American taxpayers to carry the costs of an open-borders agenda, the incoming Congress must work to roll back these programs that encourage illegal immigration. FAIR recommends the following reforms to prevent NGOs and other organizations from continuing to support illegal immigration:
- Prohibit the disbursal of any funds to any NGO providing transportation, lodging, or legal services to inadmissible aliens.
- Defund the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and the International Organization for Migration (IOM).
- Require the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to issue an annual report on SSP and EFSP-H funding and spending for any year that the program is in effect, including listing all organizations to which funding was disbursed and the purpose of those disbursements, with the first report including all data beginning with the creation of EFSP-H through the current fiscal year.
Temporary Protected Status Reform
Temporary Protected Status (TPS) was created through the Immigration Act of 1990 and can be granted to certain foreign nationals based on: (1) armed conflict; (2) environmental disaster; or (3) extraordinary and temporary conditions in their home countries.[50] Except for armed conflict, the conditions in the foreign country must be of a temporary nature to qualify. After a country is designated for TPS by the Secretary of Homeland Security, beneficiaries are granted a temporary stay of deportation and work authorization.
To designate a country for TPS, the government must determine that:
- There is an ongoing armed conflict within a foreign state and, due to that conflict, the return of nationals to that state would pose a serious threat to their safety;
- There has been an earthquake, flood, drought, epidemic, or other environmental disaster resulting in a substantial, but temporary, disruption of living conditions; the foreign state is unable, temporarily, to handle adequately the return of its nationals; and the foreign state officially has requested designation; or
- There exist extraordinary and temporary conditions in the foreign state that prevent aliens who are nationals of the state from returning to the state in safety.[51]
In theory, TPS was created to provide temporary humanitarian relief. But in practice, TPS is anything but temporary, as foreign nationals (whether they entered illegally or not) have been allowed to live in the United States – some for more than two decades – without fear of removal. Through consistent extensions and redesignations, TPS has created fresh incentives for illegal aliens to flood across our borders.
Additionally, the practice of “re-designating” a country for TPS, which the Biden-Harris administration has repeatedly done, has no basis in law. Each time a country is re-designated, any nationals of that country physically present and living in the United States are protected from deportation. The statute governing TPS only authorizes designations, extensions, and terminations, because the protection was meant to be temporary. The notion that the government could, without statutory authority, “re-designate” a country by simply using the original emergency – for the purpose of giving work authorization and protection from deportation to people who were not in the U.S. at the time of the first designation – is outrageous.
Given the rampant abuse in the program, Congress must consider putting an end to the program. At minimum, FAIR recommends the following policy changes to limit the use of TPS:
- Restrict eligibility for TPS to aliens who can establish they were legally admitted to the U.S. and did not overstay their visa or period of authorized stay.
- Limit TPS to a single extension and make all extensions subject to approval from Congress.
- Prohibit “redesignating” countries for TPS.
- Limit the broad discretion of the DHS Secretary to grant TPS by eliminating the open-ended ability to grant protections based on “extraordinary and temporary conditions.”
Immigration Enforcement
The illegal alien population in the U.S. is comprised of those who illegally cross the border, overstay their visas, or were paroled into the U.S., and, by definition, have no legal status. Unfortunately, after four years of the Biden-Harris administration, all three categories have grown considerably. As of June 2023, FAIR estimated the total number of illegal aliens in the country to be at least 16.8 million.[52] This number is 2.3 million higher than our illegal alien population estimate from 2020—an increase of 16 percent during just the first two years of the Biden-Harris administration.[53] And the illegal alien population has only continued to grow, as border encounters hit a record high by the end of FY 2023 and reached their second highest level in FY 2024.[54]
Congress must take decisive actions to bolster interior enforcement, remove illegal aliens already in the country, and hold those who violate our immigration laws accountable.
Detaining and Removing Illegal Aliens
Under the Biden-Harris administration, ICE’s non-detained docket has exploded to nearly 7.7 million illegal aliens—more than double the FY 2021 total of 3.6 million.[55] Of the record non-detained population, more than 425,000 have criminal convictions and another 222,000 have criminal charges pending.[56]
Among the convicted criminals on the non-detained docket, over 13,000 have convictions for murder and another 15,000 have convictions for sexual assault.[57] Beyond that, 56,000 aliens have convictions related to dangerous drugs; 62,000 have convictions for assault; 18,000 have convictions for larceny (theft); 14,000 have convictions for burglary; 13,000 have convictions for weapons offenses; and 2,500 have convictions for kidnapping.[58]
Another key factor driving the spike of illegal immigration is the number of visa overstays. Many foreign nationals who enter through the nonimmigrant visa system, obtaining temporary visas for activities related to business or education, stay past the visas’ expiration dates. In FY 2023 alone, DHS estimated that 565,155 nonimmigrants overstayed their visas.[59] These numbers raise serious concerns, especially since history has shown that such individuals may pose a threat to national security while on U.S. soil. Those threats are nowhere more apparent than the 9/11 terror attacks when multiple hijackers entered the country on visas that they then overstayed.[60]
Despite the rapidly growing number of illegal aliens on ICE’s non-detained docket, the Biden-Harris administration has not increased its deportation efforts. In fact, quite the opposite has occurred. The Biden-Harris administration only removed 136,313 aliens on average each year from FY 2021 to FY 2024.[61] This number of removals is even more astonishing considering more than 1.4 million aliens currently on the non-detained docket have final orders of removal.[62] By comparison, during the four years of the Trump administration (FY 2017 through FY 2020), ICE removed 233,838 on average.[63]
Reducing the number of illegal aliens deported was clearly the intended result. Under the Biden-Harris administration, DHS has proactively undermined ICE’s ability to fulfill its enforcement mission. On September 30, 2021, DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas issued a memorandum titled “Guidelines for the Enforcement of Civil Immigration Law,” which stated that an alien’s legal status in the United States should not be the sole basis of an enforcement action.[64] On October 27, 2021, Secretary Mayorkas issued another memorandum titled “Guidelines for Enforcement Actions in or Near Protected Areas,” which listed numerous protected areas where the enforcement of federal immigration law should not occur.[65] Together these policy memoranda have effectively handcuffed rank-and-file ICE agents who remain committed to enforcing our immigration laws and removing illegal aliens from the country.
Rather than removing illegal aliens, the Biden-Harris administration has sought to make their stay in the country easier by offering them social services and creating a program to offer them photo ID cards. In essence, this “IDs for illegal aliens” program, being developed through ICE’s Secure Docket Card Program, is designed to accommodate lawbreakers and make it easier for them to stay in the U.S. longer. With millions of illegal aliens released into the United States, the Secure Docket Card program would offer illegal aliens a new government-issued photo ID to make their unlawful stay in the United States more convenient.[66]
FAIR recommends the following reforms to help quickly detain and remove illegal aliens:
- Empower ICE to remove those in the country illegally by substantially increasing manpower and increasing detention space to a minimum of 150,000 beds.
- Require DHS to utilize every available detention bed before resorting to Alternatives to Detention (ATD).
- If detention beds are filled, require that aliens released into the country be enrolled in ATD with mandatory GPS monitoring for the duration of their immigration proceedings.
- Amend 236(c) to require the mandatory detention and transfer to immigration authorities of illegal aliens who commit crimes in the country.[67]
- Prohibit the Secure Docket Card program, or any substantially similar program.
- Establish a visa bond system that requires individuals with nonimmigrant visas to pay a deposit before being granted admission into the United States.
- Bar admission for visa overstayers for a certain period of time.
- Use 243(d) to require the State Department to discontinue granting visas to nationals of countries that refuse to repatriate their citizens; delete the notification requirement in statute.[68]
Protecting Unaccompanied Alien Children
While unaccompanied alien children (UACs) have long been susceptible to exploitation, the open-borders policies of the Biden-Harris administration have worsened the UAC crisis by encouraging record numbers of children to make the dangerous journey to the U.S. and then placing them with poorly vetted sponsors within the country.
The UAC crisis was spawned, in part, by the Flores Settlement and William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPRA).[69] The Flores Settlement, signed in 1997, requires that the government release children “without unnecessary delay” to: (1) parents; (2) legal guardians; (3) other adult relatives; (4) other adults designated by parents/guardians; (5) a “licensed program” willing to accept custody; or (6) any other adult or entity that wants custody if there is no other alternative.[70] And the 2008 TVPRA essentially created a mass catch-and-release program for UACs arriving from all countries – except Canada and Mexico – by requiring that CBP transfer them to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) within 72 hours, which then releases them to sponsors – sometimes their own parents.[71]
President Biden’s mass release policies, beginning with the exemption of UACs and families from Title 42 expulsions, exacerbated an already growing problem. During the Biden-Harris administration, a record number of UACs, more than 500,000, arrived at our borders.[72] Facing this deluge, HHS prioritized speed over proper vetting to quickly place children with sponsors. With that approach, it wasn’t long before whistleblowers revealed that vulnerable UACs were being released to sponsors who listed addresses that did not exist or were traced to abandoned houses or even open fields.[73] And without comprehensive DNA testing in place for UACs and sponsors, HHS has had no real way to verify that UACs are related to sponsors claiming to be parents or relatives.[74] Worse yet, HHS generally ends its oversight of UACs when they are placed with sponsors, meaning there is no way to track their well-being or compliance with immigration proceedings.
Unsurprisingly, the DHS Inspector General released a report in August 2024 revealing that ICE had lost track of more than 32,000 UACs in just four years.[75] That shocking report followed a New York Times exposé revealing that HHS had lost contact with more than 85,000 UACs during the first two years of the Biden-Harris administration.[76] As of May 2024, ICE had not issued Notices to Appear (NTAs) or scheduled court dates for more than 291,000 UACs, making it much more difficult to keep track of their whereabouts.[77] Roughly 90,000 of these minors crossed into the U.S. as far back as 2021, yet still do not have court dates.[78] After rushed placements and lost contact, it is tragically certain that some of these children were forced into trafficking or other exploitative situations.
Beyond the rushed and negligent placement of UACs, the policies governing UACs have long been abused by criminals and gangs to filter their members into the country. Many of these UACs are not actually minors, but older teenage males.[79] In FY 2023, nearly 70 percent of UACs placed with sponsors were aged 15-18, and only 19 percent were aged 12 and under.[80] Despite the disproportionate share of teenagers among the UAC population, HHS does not request UACs’ criminal records from their home countries to determine whether they are affiliated with dangerous gangs or pose threats to public safety.[81]
Without policies that require greater scrutiny of the UAC population and sponsors, vulnerable children will continue to be hastily released to unvetted and potentially dangerous sponsors. FAIR recommends that Congress implement the following policy changes to reform our UAC policies and protect child safety:
- Reduce the UAC population in the United States by creating consistent requirements for expeditious processing, screening, and repatriation of UACs to their home countries, regardless of national origin.
- If UACs from contiguous countries are not swiftly repatriated due to asylum claims or potential human trafficking, require hearings before an immigration judge within 14 days after being screened.
- Ensure that UACs are truly UACs; as the statutory definition requires, stop designating children with illegal alien parents or legal guardians in the country as UACs, and instead process them for removal with their illegal alien parents or guardians.
- Limit the release of UACs to parents or legal guardians to protect UACs from criminals and other bad actors.
- Require that HHS implement DNA testing of UACs and sponsors to verify familial relationships and protect against human trafficking and exploitation of minors.
- Expand background checks – including criminal and immigration status checks – to everyone in a sponsor’s household before placement to promote safe home environments for UACs.
- Require the Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) to conduct background checks on all UACs, including contacting home countries or last habitual residences to gather information on criminal records or activities.
- Instruct HHS to refer all criminal/gang-affiliated UACs to the Department of Justice (DOJ) for investigation or prosecution and to hold those UACs in secure facilities rather than releasing them.
Prohibiting Sanctuary Policies & Empowering State and Local Law Enforcement
State and local law enforcement agencies play a crucial role in combatting illegal immigration. It is imperative that the 119th Congress provide these agencies with reliable support to arrest, detain, and transfer illegal aliens to immigration authorities. That support is indispensable to protecting American communities.
Instead of encouraging states and local jurisdictions to enforce immigration laws, the Biden-Harris administration has allowed sanctuary jurisdictions to thrive. These jurisdictions intentionally prevent collection and sharing of immigration information with immigration authorities, refuse to hold illegal aliens already in their custody in order to transfer them to ICE, and otherwise obstruct the detention and removal of illegal aliens, making immigration enforcement much harder and creating grave threats to Americans in those jurisdictions. Under the Biden-Harris administration, sanctuary jurisdictions have been empowered by a culture of anti-enforcement and have been encouraged through policies that restrict ICE from fulfilling the core functions of its mission. At present, there are more than 600 sanctuary jurisdictions.
Perhaps the most important program for improving immigration enforcement at the state and local level is the 287(g) program. The 287(g) program allows ICE to delegate specific immigration enforcement duties – with guidance and oversight – to state and local law enforcement agencies. Through the program, ICE partners with state and local law enforcement to more efficiently identify and remove dangerous aliens instead of simply releasing them back into American communities.[82] Under the Biden-Harris administration, however, existing 287(g) contracts between state and local law enforcement agencies and ICE have been allowed to expire, and the administration has not sought to enter new contracts.
The 119th Congress must make it a priority to support immigration enforcement through cracking down on sanctuary jurisdictions and bolstering the 287(g) program. To improve the enforcement of our immigration laws at the state and local levels, FAIR recommends the following measures:
- Bar certain federal grants to sanctuary jurisdictions that refuse to collect immigration information, share immigration information, allow immigration agents into state and local prisons and jails, hold illegal aliens for transfer of custody to ICE, or otherwise refuse to cooperate with immigration enforcement.
- Support the 287(g) program through renewing current contracts and allowing state and local law enforcement agencies to enter new ones.
- Require that, in order to terminate 287(g) agreements, ICE must show that state or local agencies were not fulfilling their obligations under the agreements. This will help to prevent ICE terminations in support of an anti-enforcement agenda.
- Provide adequate training for law enforcement agencies participating in the 287(g) program.
- Restore the Criminal Apprehension Program (CAP) and Secure Communities program to facilitate information sharing, screen aliens in jails or prison for removability, and expedite removals; condition federal grants on participation in these programs.
- Fully reimburse state and local law enforcement for expenses directly related to illegal immigration, including by expanding funding for the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program (SCAAP) for costs associated with incarcerating illegal aliens.
- Provide state officials with the authority to sue the federal government for not enforcing the detention and removal requirements under Sections 235 and 236.[83]
- Require that the DOJ bring enforcement actions against jurisdictions violating 8 U.S.C. § 1373.
Mandatory E-Verify, Worksite Enforcement & Remittances
There is overwhelming consensus that many, if not most, illegal aliens come to the United States for economic opportunity. Therefore, strengthening worksite enforcement and ending the unlawful employment of illegal aliens are fundamentally important steps to reducing illegal immigration.
Worksite enforcement is a crucial tool that ICE uses to hold accountable the employers who ignore federal law and hire illegal aliens instead of American workers. However, on October 12, 2021, DHS published a memorandum entitled, “Worksite Enforcement: The Strategy to Protect the American Labor Market, the Conditions of the American Worksite, and the Dignity of the Individual.” [84] Under this guidance, the Biden-Harris administration effectively barred ICE from conducting worksite enforcement. In other words, the administration openly sanctioned violating our immigration laws and undermining the American worker.
Worksite enforcement should be resumed full-force, including by conducting I-9 audits to ensure compliance with the law. In FY 2019, before the COVID-19 pandemic, Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) began 6,812 worksite investigations and 6,456 I-9 audits, marking an appreciable increase under the Trump administration.[85] In just one illustrative example, in August of 2019, ICE raided seven poultry processing plants across the state of Mississippi, run primarily by Koch Foods.[86] In total, they arrested 680 removable aliens who were supposedly working jobs that Americans refused.[87] When Koch Foods held a job fair to replace their illegal workforce, 200 American citizens applied before noon on the first day.[88] This enforcement is pivotal to preventing employers from hiring illegal aliens over U.S. workers and should be immediately restarted.
However, the need for worksite enforcement would be significantly tempered if Congress required employers to take proactive steps to ensure that their workforce is legal. This means legally mandating that all employers use E-Verify. E-Verify allows employers to authenticate the legal work eligibility of prospective applicants by comparing the name and Social Security number of employees to government records. In practice, it operates much the same way a merchant verifies a credit card purchase. Created by Congress in 1996, the E-Verify program has a 99.7 percent accuracy rate, is free, and usually takes less than five seconds to complete.
Requiring that all businesses use E-Verify would help end the supply of illegal workers. When we finally shut off the magnet that draws illegal workers here, we will also shut off much of the flow. Millions of U.S. citizens could find gainful employment if they did not have to compete against illegal workers who undercut wages.
Congress must also act to stem the costs of illegal immigration by curbing the flow of remittances from illegal aliens out of the country. Remittances represent a huge outflow of cash from the U.S. to foreign economies, totaling billions of dollars in lost revenue for states and cities around the country. The transfer of massive sums of money only increases the cost of illegal immigration to American taxpayers. First, Americans pay the social welfare costs created by illegal immigration. Then, through remittances, Americans lose the potential economic gain from illegal workers reinvesting their money into the U.S. economy – or at the very least, saving it to pay for their own social services. Remittances also help facilitate criminal activity as cartels and other bad actors have developed complex schemes to exploit outgoing wire transfers to fund drug and human trafficking operations.[89]
To help ensure our workforce is legal and stem the costs of illegal immigration, FAIR recommends the following measures:
- Permanently authorize the E-Verify program and provide adequate funding to guarantee the future of the program.
- Make the E-Verify program mandatory for all employers, to be used for all existing workers and new hires.
- Prohibit the government from granting work authorization to illegal aliens, including aliens with deferred action, deferred enforced departure (DED), parole, and TPS.
- Permit civil actions by employers against other employers who intentionally fail to verify work eligibility for their employees.
- Increase and consistently apply civil and criminal penalties against employers of illegal aliens.
- Support worksite enforcement operations with more ICE agents.
Taxpayer Benefits
Granting benefits to illegal aliens does nothing more than use taxpayer dollars to reward illegal behavior and encourage more illegal immigration. The 119th Congress must clarify that only aliens with lawful status (not aliens who are merely “lawfully present”) are eligible for taxpayer-funded benefits and ensure that the government is not implementing policies that encourage illegal immigration by allowing access to public benefits.
In the same vein, immigrants intending to enter the country through the legal process must be self-sufficient. Public charge restrictions for immigrants have been part of U.S. immigration policy for more than a century, and self-sufficiency has been a basic principle of United States immigration law since this country’s earliest immigration statutes. Public charge restrictions should be strengthened, not weakened, including by limiting welfare programs used by immigrants, considering the receipt of public benefits by an alien’s dependents, and placing additional weight on factors such as skills, education, and financial resources that are proven to be reliable indicators of an alien’s likelihood of becoming a public charge.
FAIR advocates enacting the following measures to protect American taxpayers:
- Prohibit parolees, TPS beneficiaries, DACA beneficiaries, and asylum applicants from accessing public benefits, including by amending the definitions of “qualified alien” in 8 U.S.C. § 1621 and 1641, and amending Title 42 to restrict benefits for illegal aliens.
- Prohibit DHS from granting immigration benefits until all background checks are completed to its satisfaction.
- Close loopholes allowing illegal aliens to access tax credits such as the Additional Child Tax Credit (ACTC) and Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC).
- Reform public charge requirements under INA 212(a)(4) to ensure that intending immigrants are self-sufficient. This includes:
- Creating a specific definition of a “public charge,” such as aliens receiving one or more designated public benefits for more than 12 months in the aggregate within any 36-month period;
- Setting forth a specific list of designated public benefits; and
- Requiring sponsors of legal immigrants to reimburse the government for any of these public benefits the immigrant uses in the U.S.[90]
- Require schools and hospitals to collect non-identifiable data regarding the immigration status of students and patients to better ascertain the costs of illegal immigration. Deny certain federal funds to institutions that do not comply.
Reforming Legal Immigration & Protecting the American Worker
While illegal immigration often dominates the discussion about immigration policy, our nation’s legal immigration system is also in need of serious reform. Currently, our legal immigration system serves no identifiable public or national interests. Instead, uncontrolled immigration is impacting Americans’ quality of life and raising deep concerns about the capacity of our school systems, physical infrastructure, state budgets, and health care system.
Our immigration system is also plagued by an insatiable appetite for nonimmigrant guest workers. Over the course of numerous presidential administrations, our guest worker programs have expanded dramatically. As a result, American workers are becoming increasingly displaced by guest workers willing to work for substandard wages, a troubling development given that American workers have also been forced to compete with millions of illegal aliens for jobs.
Now more than ever, Congress must work to protect American workers and reform our legal immigration system towards a merit-based process.
Establishing a Merit-Based Immigration System
The population of the U.S. has dramatically increased over the past few decades, depleting natural resources, such as clean air and water, while increasing demand for petroleum, food, and other commodities. This problem will only get worse as the Census Bureau projects that the total U.S. population will reach more than 400 million people by 2060 if current immigration trends continue.[91] By 2060, the foreign-born population of the United States is expected to increase to nearly 70 million, up from 47.8 million today.[92] If Congress does not fundamentally change U.S. immigration policies, the country will continue on this trajectory of unsustainable population growth.
Under the current immigration system, most legal immigrants are admitted solely because they are
related to other immigrants. However, family-based, or chain, immigration is not limited to nuclear family members, i.e., spouses and minor children. It includes extended family members such as siblings, parents, and adult children. All these relatives are admitted based on their family ties.
And, in time, each of these extended family members can petition for other relatives. Along with skyrocketing population growth, because of family chain migration, highly qualified and skilled individuals from the rest of the world – who would benefit the United States – are shut out of the opportunity to immigrate to the country.
The 119th Congress must enact reforms to reduce overall levels of immigration and admit immigrants who have the education and skills to succeed in 21st century America.
FAIR recommends the following reforms:
- Reduce overall legal immigration to a sensible level and transition to a new system that prioritizes skills over family ties.
- Interpret the full text of the 14th Amendment to deny citizenship to children born in the United States to illegal alien parents.
- End chain migration by limiting family-based green card eligibility to spouses and minor children of U.S. citizens and legal permanent residents.
- Establish a points system to evaluate applicants for employment-based green cards, including English language ability, job offers, investments, age, industry, and extraordinary achievements.
- End the visa lottery.
- Cut refugee admissions by more than half while the humanitarian crisis at the southern border is addressed.
Protecting the American Worker
In addition to our flawed legal immigration system, our guest worker programs have expanded to appease U.S. employers’ endless appetite for cheap foreign labor. An influx of illegal aliens and nonimmigrant guest workers dramatically increases competition in the labor market, particularly for low-skilled jobs, and depresses wages by creating a class of workers who are willing to work for substandard wages.
Open-borders advocates claim that a massive foreign workforce is necessary because foreign workers will supposedly perform jobs that Americans won’t do. However, this is a thoroughly debunked myth. Foreign workers do not do jobs that Americans won’t do. Rather, they accept wages that Americans reject. And the reason the wages are low is because the supply of foreign labor, including illegal alien workers, continues. It’s a self-propagating cycle that must be broken.
In short, unlimited access to cheap foreign labor undermines employers’ motivation to pay livable wages and offer good working conditions. According to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), from September 2023 to September 2024, over 1.3 million native-born Americans lost jobs.[93] During that same period, more than 1.2 million new jobs went to foreign-born workers.[94]
To hold employers accountable and prioritize American workers, FAIR recommends the following measures:
- H-1B: Skilled Workers
- End the dual-intent nature of H-1B visas; the H-1B guest worker program is for temporary workers and should not be a pathway to citizenship.
- Prevent employers from paying H-1B workers less than Americans in the same roles, including by distributing H-1B workers to certified positions ranked in order by salary offered, rather than by random lottery, thereby driving up the wages of both American workers and H-1B recipients, and by requiring the Department of Labor (DOL) to adjust wage levels to ensure that workers are highly skilled.
- Change the H-1B selection process to reward H-1B applicants who earned a master’s degree (or higher) from an American university.
- Require employers to truly demonstrate that they actively sought to recruit American workers and offered positions to qualified ones before turning to H-1B workers.
- Implement more effective enforcement mechanisms and increased investigations, including random audits.
- H-2A: Unskilled Agricultural Workers
- The H-2A program serves no real purpose in a 21st century economy, exploits farmworkers, and should be ended. It prevents American farms from adopting labor-saving technology already widely used by farmers throughout Europe and Asia.
- H-2B: Unskilled Non-Agricultural Workers
- Require DOL to review the prevailing wage estimates and implement more realistic estimates that consider national and not just regional wage rates, making it more difficult for employers to game the system and underpay foreign workers taking American jobs.
- Require DOL to more vigorously review which categories of industries truly need labor, and trim eligibility for the program accordingly.
- Increase fees to support worksite enforcement; USCIS must raise fees associated with the H-2B program so that employers choosing to hire foreign guest workers instead of Americans can support the worksite enforcement work of DOL and DHS.
- Deny cap increases.
- Protect H-2B workers from employer abuse – prosecute allegations of employer mistreatment of guest workers and enforce financial and criminal penalties against negligent employers.
- L-1: Intracompany Transfer
- Institute a numerical cap; the L-1 cannot remain uncapped while the H-1B has a visa cap.
- Introduce a labor certification requirement; L-1 applications do not undergo even the basic limited scrutiny that H-1B, H-2B, and even H-2A petitions require.
- Limit the companies that can use L-1 workers to small companies that need specialized workers.
- Create a wage floor for L-1 employees so that the program is only used by high-skilled and highly compensated employees.
- J-1: Exchange Visitors
- Demand a full audit and review by the State Department – the program has grown wildly out of control from its original purpose of enhancing international cultural exchange.
- Require labor certification through DOL and introduce a numerical cap for the same reasons as the L-1 program.
- Enhance oversight through worksite enforcement, ensuring that J-1 employers are not abusing, mistreating, or exploiting their foreign workers.
- Optional Practical Training (OPT)
- The program is not congressionally authorized; DHS does not have “dual authority” with Congress to authorize classes of aliens for employment. The program is unlawful and simply allows students without any unusual skill to stay in the U.S. indefinitely—one that allows them to unfairly compete with American students. It should be ended.
- H-4 Work Authorization
- Like the OPT program, the program allowing H-4 visa holders – spouses of H-1B visa holders – to receive a work permit is not congressionally authorized and essentially results in the increase of foreign guest workers. The program should be ended.
Defending Voting Integrity
Under the Biden-Harris administration’s open-borders policies, the noncitizen population in the United States has reached record highs. It is eminently important to take immediate steps to safeguard the integrity of our election systems so that only American votes are counted.
The spike in the illegal alien population reflects recent data from the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey (ACS) showing that the nation’s broader foreign-born population has also exploded, increasing nearly 20 percent since 2010. The foreign-born population has now reached 14.3 percent (47.8 million) of the total U.S. population, up from 12.9 percent (40 million) in 2010.[95]
The rise in illegal immigration is so significant that it is impacting congressional apportionment, with the 2020 census leading to multiple congressional seats shifting across the country.[96] States such as New York, Illinois, and California all lost one House seat each, while Florida gained one seat and Texas two.[97] More broadly, the average population represented by each seat in the House reached 761,169 in 2020.[98] Since then, however, nearly 11 million illegal aliens have crossed our borders and there are now enough individuals residing in the country illegally to account for roughly 22 House seats.
There is ample opportunity for illegal aliens (and other noncitizens) to register to vote. Under the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA), state motor vehicle departments are required to offer driver’s license applicants the opportunity to register to vote, even while many states (19 plus the District of Columbia) provide driver’s licenses to illegal aliens.[99] Moreover, under the NVRA, individuals registering to vote are only required to check a box affirming eligibility, not provide proof of that eligibility.
In response to growing concerns about illegal aliens voting in federal elections, several state election officials and governors have acted to remove noncitizens from voter rolls. For instance, Texas has removed over 6,500 noncitizens from its voter rolls, Virginia removed 6,303 from its voter rolls, and Alabama has removed 3,251 from its rolls.[100] Yet, to date, Congress has failed to act. Below are just a few specific examples of aliens voting in federal elections:
- April 15, 2024: An alien pleaded guilty to two counts of illegal disclosure of a Social Security number. He admitted to using his false identity to vote in federal elections since approximately 2004.[101]
- December 10, 2019: U.S. District Judge John A. Menendez sentenced a Mexican national for aggravated identity theft, passport fraud, and illegally voting in multiple federal elections.[102]
- September 27, 2019: U.S. District Judge Deborah K. Chasanow sentenced a Ghanaian national for passport fraud. He admitted to falsely claiming American citizenship and illegally voting in ten federal elections.[103]
- August 9, 2018: U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of North Carolina Robert Higdon announced the sentencing of a Mexican national for knowingly voting in the 2012 and 2016 presidential elections.[104]
- November 27, 2017: A Cuban national pleaded guilty to casting fraudulent ballots in six elections for federal candidates, including the 2012 presidential election. The Cuban national falsely claimed to be a U.S. citizen when he registered to vote in 2009.[105]
- October 20, 2017: The DOJ announced a Nigerian national was sentenced for voter fraud and illegal reentry into the United States after being removed. The Nigerian national falsely claimed to be a U.S. citizen when he registered to vote in 2012. He voted in the 2012 and 2016 presidential elections.[106]
Given the extraordinary growth of the noncitizen population, the 119th Congress must take steps to protect against noncitizens, including illegal aliens, impacting congressional district and Electoral College apportionment and casting votes in federal elections. FAIR recommends the following measures to ensure that American voices are not diluted by noncitizens:
- Reinstate a citizenship question on the U.S. census and mandate that only American citizens are counted towards congressional district and Electoral College apportionment.
- Require states to obtain documentary proof of citizenship when registering individuals to vote in federal elections.
- Require states to purge noncitizens from their voter rolls on an ongoing basis.
- Create a private right of action for citizens to bring civil suits against election officials who fail to uphold proof of citizenship requirements.
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Footnotes and endnotes
[1] Federation for American Immigration Reform, “The Fiscal Burden of Illegal Immigration on United States Taxpayers,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, Mar. 8, 2023, https://www.fairus.org/issue/publications-resources/fiscal-burden-illegal-immigration-united-states-taxpayers-2023.
[2] Joe Chatham, “Now the Senate’s Turn to Act on H.R. 2, the Secure the Border Act,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, May 15, 2023, https://www.fairus.org/legislation/congress/now-senates-turn-act-hr-2-secure-border-act.
[3] U.S. Customs and Border Protection, “Nationwide Encounters,” U.S. Customs and Border Protection, last modified Dec. 19, 2024, https://www.cbp.gov/newsroom/stats/nationwide-encounters.
[4] House Committee on Homeland Security, “Crisis by Design: A Comprehensive Look at the Biden-Harris Administration’s Unprecedented Border Crisis,” House Committee on Homeland Security, Sept. 18, 2024, https://homeland.house.gov/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/September-2024-Border-Report.pdf.
[5] U.S. Customs and Border Protection, “CBP Enforcement Statistics,” U.S. Customs and Border Protection, last modified Dec. 19, 2024, https://www.cbp.gov/newsroom/stats/cbp-enforcement-statistics.
[6] U.S. Customs and Border Protection, “Criminal Noncitizen Statistics,” U.S. Customs and Border Protection, last modified Dec. 19, 2024, https://www.cbp.gov/newsroom/stats/cbp-enforcement-statistics/criminal-noncitizen-statistics.
[7] U.S. Customs and Border Protection, “CBP Enforcement Statistics,” U.S. Customs and Border Protection, last modified Dec. 19, 2024, https://www.cbp.gov/newsroom/stats/cbp-enforcement-statistics; FAIR Staff, “1.7 Million Special Interest Aliens Encountered over Past Three Years, According to New Congressional Report,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, Oct. 7, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/news/executive/1-point-7-million-special-interest-aliens-encountered-over-past-three-years-according-new.
[8] House Judiciary Committee, “New Data Reveal Worsening Magnitude of the Biden Border Crisis and Lack of Interior Immigration Enforcement,” House Judiciary Committee, Jan. 18, 2024, https://judiciary.house.gov/sites/evo-subsites/republicans-judiciary.house.gov/files/evo-media-document/2024-01-18-new-data-reveal-worsening-magnitude-of-the-biden-border-crisis-and-lack-of-interior-immigration-enforcement.pdf.
[9] 8 U.S.C. § 1225; 8 U.S.C. § 1182(a)(6)(A).
[10] Will Riley, How Misguided Policy Attracts Unaccompanied Alien Children to the Southern Border,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, Apr. 3, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/legislation/congress/how-misguided-policy-attracts-unaccompanied-alien-children-southern-border.
[11] 8 C.F.R. § 208.13.
[12] INS v. Cardoza-Fonseca, 480 U.S. 421 (1987). See also Andrew R. Arthur, “DHS/DOJ: Raise Credible Fear Standard for Statutory Withholding and CAT,” Center for Immigration Studies, June 25, 2020, https://cis.org/Arthur/DHSDOJ-Raise-Credible-Fear-Standard-Statutory-Withholding-and-CAT.
[13] Congressional Research Service, “Credible Fear and Defensive Asylum Processes: Frequently Asked Questions,” Congressional Research Service, Sept. 25, 2024, https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R48078.
[14] Ibid.
[15] 85 FR 80274.
[16] Ibid.
[17] 28 I&N Dec. 304 (A.G. 2021); 28 I&N Dec. 307 (A.G. 2021).
[18] 87 FR 18078.
[19] 88 FR 31314.
[20] Joe Chatham, “Biden Administration Reverses Course, Issues Executive Action with Token Border Security Changes,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, June 10, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/legislation/executive/biden-administration-reverses-course-issues-executive-action-token-border.
[21] FAIR Staff, “July Border Numbers Offer Little Comfort to Americans,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, Aug. 19, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/news/executive/july-border-numbers-offer-little-comfort-americans.
[22] Ibid.
[23] U.S. Customs and Border Protection, “Nationwide Encounters,” U.S. Customs and Border Protection, last modified Dec. 19, 2024, https://www.cbp.gov/newsroom/stats/nationwide-encounters.
[24] Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, “Immigration Court Asylum Backlog,” Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, through Dec. 2023, https://trac.syr.edu/phptools/immigration/asylumbl/; Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, “Immigration Court Backlog,” Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, through Oct. 2024, https://trac.syr.edu/phptools/immigration/backlog/.
[25] Kari Jacobson, “Biden Administration Quietly Closes More than 350,000 Asylum Cases,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, June 19, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/blog/2024/06/19/biden-administration-quietly-closes-more-350000-asylum-cases.
[26] U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, “Annual Statistical Report FY 2023,” U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, n.d., https://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/document/reports/fy2023_annual_statistical_report.pdf.
[27] United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, “Form I-765 Application for Employment Authorization All Receipts, Approvals, Denials Grouped by Eligibility Category and Filing Type Fiscal Year 2021,” United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, n.d., https://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/document/data/I-765_Application_for_Employment_FY03-21.pdf; United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, “Form I-765 Application for Employment Authorization All Receipts, Approvals, Denials Grouped by Eligibility Category and Filing Type Fiscal Year 2022,” United States Citizenship and Immigration Services, n.d., https://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/document/data/I-765_Application_for_Employment_FY03-22_AnnualReport.pdf.
[28] U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, “Annual Statistical Report FY 2023,” U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, n.d., https://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/files/document/reports/fy2023_annual_statistical_report.pdf.
[29] 8 U.S.C. § 1225 (b)(1)(B)(v).
[30] 8 U.S.C. § 1158(a)(1).
[31] 8 U.S.C. § 1158(a)(2) and (b)(2)(A).
[32] 8 U.S.C. § 1158(a)(2)(A).
[33] 8 U.S.C. § 1158(b)(2)(A)(vi).
[34] 8 U.S.C. § 1101(a)(42)(A).
[35] 8 U.S.C. § 1182(d)(5).
[36] Federation for American Immigration Reform, “Immigration Parole: The Executive Branch’s Shadow Immigration System,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, Mar. 20, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/issue/immigration-parole-executive-branchs-shadow-immigration-system.
[37] U.S. Customs and Border Protection, “CBP Releases November 2024 Monthly Update,” U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Dec. 19, 2024, https://www.cbp.gov/newsroom/national-media-release/cbp-releases-november-2024-monthly-update.
[38] FAIR Staff, “Internal Homeland Security Report Proves Biden-Harris-Mayorkas CHNV Parole Program Loaded with Fraud,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, July 31, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/news/executive/internal-homeland-security-report-proves-biden-harris-mayorkas-chnv-parole-program.
[39] Ibid.
[40] Ibid.
[41] Ibid.
[42] Ibid.
[43] Joe Chatham, “President Biden Creates Unlawful and Unfair Parole-in-Place Amnesty Program,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, June 19, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/legislation/executive/president-biden-creates-unlawful-and-unfair-parole-place-amnesty-program.
[44] Federation for American Immigration Reform, “Shelter and Services Program Funding for FY2023,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, n.d., https://www.fairus.org/sites/default/files/2024-03/20240321_FY23%20SSP%20funding_final.pdf.
[45] Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2023, Pub. L. No. 117-328, 136 Stat. 4459 (2022).
[46] Congressional Research Service, “Migrant Assistance Through the FEMA Emergency Food and Shelter Program (EFSP),” Congressional Research Service, Aug. 31, 2023, https://sgp.fas.org/crs/homesec/R47681.pdf.
[47] Federal Emergency Management Agency, “Shelter and Services Program-Allocated FY23 Awards,” Federal Emergency Management Agency, last updated Aug. 30, 2024, https://www.fema.gov/grants/preparedness/shelter-services-program/fy23-awards; Federation for American Immigration Reform, “Shelter and Services Program Funding for FY2023,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, n.d., https://www.fairus.org/sites/default/files/2024-03/20240321_FY23%20SSP%20funding_final.pdf.
[48] Joe Chatham, “Congress Passes Funding Package, Leaves for Recess and Fails to Secure Border,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, Mar. 25, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/legislation/congress/congress-passes-funding-package-leaves-recess-and-fails-secure-border.
[49] FAIR Staff, “Congressional Report Slams Safe Mobility Offices Designed to Help Migrants Reach the U.S.,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, Nov. 18, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/news/executive/congressional-report-slams-safe-mobility-offices-designed-help-migrants-reach-us.
[50] 8 U.S.C. § 1254a.
[51] Ibid.
[52] Federation for American Immigration Reform, “How Many Illegal Aliens Are in the United States? 2023 Update,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, June 22, 2023, https://www.fairus.org/issue/how-many-illegal-aliens-are-united-states-2023-update.
[53] Ibid.
[54] U.S. Customs and Border Protection, “Nationwide Encounters,” U.S. Customs and Border Protection, last modified Dec. 19, 2024, https://www.cbp.gov/newsroom/stats/nationwide-encounters.
[55] FAIR Staff, “ICE’s Annual Report Highlights Open-Borders Agenda,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, Jan. 8, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/legislation/executive/ices-annual-report-highlights-open-borders-agenda; U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, “Annual Report, Fiscal Year 2024,” U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Dec. 19, 2024, https://www.ice.gov/doclib/eoy/iceAnnualReportFY2024.pdf.
[56] FAIR Staff, “ICE Acknowledges 647,000 Aliens with Criminal Charges or Convictions in the U.S.,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, Sept. 27, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/news/executive/ice-acknowledges-647000-aliens-criminal-charges-or-convictions-us.
[57] Ibid.
[58] Ibid.
[59] U.S. Customs and Border Protection, “Entry/Exit Overstay Report: Fiscal Year 2023 Report to Congress, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Aug. 5, 2024, https://www.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/2024-10/24_1011_CBP-Entry-Exit-Overstay-Report-FY23-Data.pdf.
[60] Ira Mehlman, “Illegals’ Attempt To Infiltrate Marine Base Highlights The Same Negligence That Led To 9/11,” Daily Caller, May 29, 2024, https://dailycaller.com/2024/05/29/mehlman-jordanian-immigrants-9-11-terrorist-attack-drivers-license/.
[61] U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, “Annual Report, Fiscal Year 2024,” U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Dec. 19, 2024, https://www.ice.gov/doclib/eoy/iceAnnualReportFY2024.pdf.
[62] FAIR Staff, “New Data Show over 100,000 Special Interest Aliens Have Orders of Removal but Remain Free in the U.S.,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, Dec. 16, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/news/executive/new-data-show-over-100000-special-interest-aliens-have-orders-removal-remain-free-us.
[63] Kari Jacobson, “Senators Spar Over Deportations in Senate Committee Hearing,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, Dec. 16, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/news/congress/senators-spar-over-deportations-senate-committee-hearing.
[64] Alejandro Mayorkas, “Guidelines for the Enforcement of Civil Immigration Law,” Department of Homeland Security, Sept. 30, 2021, https://www.ice.gov/doclib/news/guidelines-civilimmigrationlaw.pdf.
[65] Alejandro Mayorkas, “Guidelines for Enforcement Actions in or Near Protected Areas,” Department of Homeland Security, Oct. 27, 2021, https://www.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/publications/21_1027_opa_guidelines-enforcement-actions-in-near-protected-areas.pdf.
[66] Kari Jacobson, “ICE to Hand Out 10,000 IDs to Illegal Aliens in Pilot Program,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, May 20, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/news/executive/ice-hand-out-10000-ids-illegal-aliens-pilot-program.
[67] 8 U.S.C. § 1226(c).
[68] 8 U.S.C. § 1253(d).
[69] Stipulated Settlement Agreement, Flores v. Reno, No. 85-CV-4544 (C.D. Cal. 1997); William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act of 2008, Pub. L. No. 110-457, 122 Stat. 5044.
[70] Kari Jacobson, “New Congressional Report Details Policy Failures that Allow Gang Members to Enter as Unaccompanied Minors,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, June 24, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/news/executive/new-congressional-report-details-policy-failures-allow-gang-members-enter.
[71] Ibid.
[72] U.S. Customs and Border Protection, “Nationwide Encounters,” U.S. Customs and Border Protection, last modified Dec. 19, 2024, https://www.cbp.gov/newsroom/stats/nationwide-encounters; U.S. Customs and Border Protection, “CBP Releases Operational Fiscal Year 2021 Statistics,” U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Jan, 3, 2022, https://www.cbp.gov/newsroom/national-media-release/cbp-releases-operational-fiscal-year-2021-statistics.
[73] Kari Jacobson, “Senate Roundtable Details Exploitative Conditions for Migrant Children,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, July 15, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/news/congress/senate-roundtable-details-exploitive-conditions-migrant-children.
[74] Ibid.
[75] Kari Jacobson, “Tens of Thousands of Minors Unaccounted For, According to New Watchdog Report,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, Aug. 26, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/news/executive/tens-thousands-minors-unaccounted-according-new-watchdog-report.
[76] Hannah Dreier, “Alone and Exploited, Migrant Children Work Brutal Jobs Across the U.S.,” The New York Times, Feb. 28, 2023, https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/25/us/unaccompanied-migrant-child-workers-exploitation.html.
[77] Kari Jacobson, “Tens of Thousands of Minors Unaccounted For, According to New Watchdog Report,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, Aug. 26, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/news/executive/tens-thousands-minors-unaccounted-according-new-watchdog-report.
[78] Ibid.
[79] Kari Jacobson, “New Congressional Report Details Policy Failures that Allow Gang Members to Enter as Unaccompanied Minors,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, June 24, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/news/executive/new-congressional-report-details-policy-failures-allow-gang-members-enter.
[80] Office of Refugee Resettlement, “Fact Sheets and Data,” Office of Refugee Resettlement, July 5, 2024, https://www.acf.hhs.gov/orr/about/ucs/facts-and-data.
[81] House Judiciary Committee, “New Information and Testimony From Biden Administration Officials Reveal Disregard for Potential Gang Affiliation of UACs,” House Judiciary Committee, June 17, 2024, https://judiciary.house.gov/sites/evo-subsites/republicans-judiciary.house.gov/files/evo-media-document/2024-06-17%20New%20Information%20and%20Testimony%20from%20Biden%20Administration%20Officials%20Reveal%20Disregard%20for%20Potential%20Gang%20Affiliation%20of%20.pdf.
[82] U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, “Delegation of Immigration Authority Section 287(g) Immigration and Nationality Act,” U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, last modified May 2024, https://www.ice.gov/identify-and-arrest/287g.
[83] 8 U.S.C. § 1225; 8 U.S.C. § 1226.
[84] Alejandro Mayorkas, “Worksite Enforcement: The Strategy to Protect the American Labor Market, the Conditions of the American Worksite, and the Dignity of the Individual,” Department of Homeland Security, Oct. 12, 2021, https://www.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/publications/memo_from_secretary_mayorkas_on_worksite_enforcement.pdf.
[85] Sarah Hawk, “Corporate Compliance, Professional Perspective — I-9 Employment Verification & Compliance During the Biden Administration,” Bloomberg Law, May 2021, https://www.bloomberglaw.com/external/document/X9SJV2J4000000/corporate-compliance-professional-perspective-i-9-employment-ver.
[86] Vandana Rambaran, “ICE raids on Mississippi food processing plants result in 680 arrests,” Fox News, Aug. 17, 2019, https://www.foxnews.com/us/ice-raids-on-mississippi-food-processing-plants-result-in-680-arrests.
[87] Ibid.
[88] Kyle Hooten, “After ICE Raids, US Citizens Flock To Jobs,” Daily Caller, Aug. 13, 2019, https://dailycaller.com/2019/08/13/ice-raids-jobs/.
[89] Hannah Davis, “Curbing Cartel Cash Flow: Ohio’s Fight Against Remittances, Federation for American Immigration Reform, May 6, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/legislation/state-and-local/curbing-cartel-cash-flow-ohios-fight-against-remittances.
[90] 8 U.S.C. §1182(a)(4).
[91] Jonathan Vespa, Lauren Medina, and David M. Armstrong, “Demographic Turning Points for the United States: Population Projections for 2020 to 2060,” U.S. Census Bureau, Feb. 2020, https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publications/2020/demo/p25-1144.pdf.
[92] Ibid.; Congressional Research Service, “Citizenship and Immigration Statuses of the U.S. Foreign-Born Population,” Congressional Research Service, Sept. 17 2024, https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF11806.
[93] Michael Dorgan, “Jobs report is a boom for migrants, slump for Americans,” Fox Business, Sept. 6, 2024, https://www.foxbusiness.com/economy/jobs-report-boom-migrants-slump-americans.
[94] Ibid.
[95] FAIR Government Relations, “House Passes Bill to Stop Illegal Aliens from Distorting Congressional Apportionment,” Federation for American Immigration Reform, May 13, 2024, https://www.fairus.org/news/congress/house-passes-bill-stop-illegal-aliens-distorting-congressional-apportionment; Congressional Research Service, “Citizenship and Immigration Statuses of the U.S. Foreign-Born Population,” Congressional Research Service, Sept. 17 2024, https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF11806.
[96] U.S. Census Bureau, “Historical Apportionment Data (1910-2020),” U.S. Census Bureau, Apr. 26, 2021, https://www.census.gov/data/tables/time-series/dec/apportionment-data-text.html.
[97] Ibid.
[98] Ibid.
[99] National Conference of State Legislatures, “States Offering Driver’s Licenses to Immigrants,” National Conference of State Legislatures, Mar. 13, 2023, https://www.ncsl.org/immigration/states-offering-drivers-licenses-to-immigrants/maptype/tile#undefined; 52 U.S.C. § 205 et seq.
[100] Office of the Texas Governor, “Governor Abbott Announces Over 1 Million Ineligible Voters Removed From Voter Rolls,” Office of the Texas Governor, Aug. 26, 2024, https://gov.texas.gov/news/post/governor-abbott-announces-over-1-million-ineligible-voters-removed-from-voter-rolls; Commonwealth of Virginia Office of the Governor – Glenn Youngkin, Executive Order 35, Aug. 7, 2024, https://www.governor.virginia.gov/media/governorvirginiagov/governor-of-virginia/pdf/eo/EO-35-Comprehensive-Election-Security-Ensuring-Legal-Voters-and-Accurate-Counting–vF–8.7.24.pdf; Alabama Secretary of State, “Secretary of State Wes Allen Implements Process to Remove Noncitizens Registered to Vote in Alabama,” Alabama Secretary of State, n.d., https://www.sos.alabama.gov/index.php/newsroom/secretary-state-wes-allen-implements-process-remove-noncitizens-registered-vote-alabama.
[101] U.S. Attorney’s Office, Western District of Washington, “Sumner, Washington, man pleads guilty to disclosure of Social Security Number for more than 20 years of living under a false identity,” U.S. Attorney’s Office, Western District of Washington, Apr. 15, 2024, https://www.justice.gov/usao-wdwa/pr/sumner-washington-man-pleads-guilty-disclosure-social-security-number-more-20-years.
[102] U.S. Attorney’s Office, Eastern District of California, “Illegal Alien Residing in Sacramento Sentenced for Aggravated Identity Theft, Passport Fraud, and Voting by an Alien,” U.S. Attorney’s Office, Eastern District of California, Dec. 10, 2019, https://www.justice.gov/usao-edca/pr/illegal-alien-residing-sacramento-sentenced-aggravated-identity-theft-passport-fraud.
[103] U.S. Attorney’s Office, District of Maryland, “Physician Sentenced to 15 Months in Federal Prison for Passport Fraud,” U.S. Attorney’s Office, District of Maryland, Sept. 27, 2019, https://www.justice.gov/usao-md/pr/physician-sentenced-15-months-federal-prison-passport-fraud.
[104] U.S. Attorney’s Office, Eastern District of North Carolina, “Nash County Man Sentenced for Voting by an Alien,” U.S. Attorney’s Office, Eastern District of North Carolina, Aug. 9, 2018, https://www.justice.gov/usao-ednc/pr/nash-county-man-sentenced-voting-alien.
[105] U.S. Attorney’s Office, Western District of Missouri, “Cuban National Pleads Guilty to Illegally Voting, False Tax Returns,” U.S. Attorney’s Office, Western District of Missouri, Nov. 27, 2017, https://www.justice.gov/usao-wdmo/pr/cuban-national-pleads-guilty-illegally-voting-false-tax-returns.
[106] U.S. Department of Justice Office of Public Affairs, “Nigerian Citizen Sentenced to 6 ½ Years in Prison for $12 Million Tax Refund Fraud, Voter Fraud, and Illegal Reentry,” U.S. Department of Justice Office of Public Affairs, Oct. 20, 2017, https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/nigerian-citizen-sentenced-6-years-prison-12-million-tax-refund-fraud-voter-fraud-and-illegal.