Almost 7,000 Syrians live in the United States under Temporary Protected Status (TPS), and they are anxiously waiting to see whether the Department of Homeland Security will end or extend their TPS this week. So far, the Trump administration has ended TPS for people from El Salvador, Haiti, Nicaragua and Sudan. A decision is due by tomorrow.
So you married someone from India, brought your spouse to the United States on an immediate relative visa, and started a family. Now you’d like to bring Grandma over to help take care of the kids—but she’s not part of the nuclear family, according to the Trump administration’s proposal to end many family visas. Articles from the New York Times, Vox, the Cato Institute, and Politico debunk the myths around what Trump calls “chain migration.”
And in other immigration news, immigrants from Latin America send increasing amounts of money back home, the Trump administration tries another tactic to get rid of asylum applicants, and a federal judge claims jurisdiction in cases from the Somali deportation plane,
Temporary Protected Status—Syrians, Haitians in the news
Thousands of Syrians in the U.S. await pivotal decision on protections (The Guardian, 1/28/17) January 30 is the deadline to announce a decision on extending TPS for Syrians.
“Donald Trump’s administration this week will decide whether to allow 6,900 Syrians to continue being protected from deportation – or force them to return to a country ravaged by starvation, airstrikes, barrel bombs and chemical weapon attacks….
“Alzayat said many in the state department are pushing for renewal, but ultimately the decision is in the hands of the homeland security department and White House. “It would be a huge, huge slap in the face of Tillerson and an indictment of how weak the state department has become if these people are returned,” he said.
“Advocates favor a re-designation of TPS for Syrians, which would allow an additional 2,000 people to be protected by it. If it is only renewed, the protection will continue to apply exclusively to those who already qualified for TPS. If it is terminated, the protection will end in March.”
Syrians with temporary U.S. protection brace for Trump decision (Reuters, 1/26/18)
“Targeted by the Syrian government after providing humanitarian supplies to civilians fleeing air strikes, Mohammad Alala and his wife escaped in 2012, eventually obtaining student visas to enter the United States.
“They received a form of temporary protected status (TPS) extended to Syrians in the United States because of Syria’s civil war. After moving to Florida, Alala found work as an engineer and his wife, Dania Kassas, enrolled in graduate school.
“Now, the couple’s ability to remain in the United States legally is uncertain. Their asylum claims are unresolved and TPS for Syrians will expire at the end of March unless the Department of Homeland Security decides to extend it.”
NAACP sues Homeland Security on behalf of Haitians, cites Trump’s ‘public hostility’ (Miami Herald, 1/24/18)
“In a lawsuit filed Wednesday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland, the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund argues that Acting Homeland Secretary Elaine Duke’s November decision to end Temporary Protected Status, or TPS, for Haiti as of July 2019 is “irrational and discriminatory,” and influenced by President Donald Trump’s “public hostility toward immigrants of colo
Family visas
The Facts Behind the Weaponized Phrase ‘Chain MIgration’ (New York Times, 1/26/18) The Times reports that, “Republicans argue it’s a useful shorthand for family sponsorship.”
Because “family sponsorship” is so difficult to pronounce? Or because it has two extra syllables?
Family sponsorship does NOT bring in distant relatives. It’s only for spouses and children and parents and siblings, with very long wait lists for siblings, and somewhat shorter wait lists for others. So today’s family values mean that you can’t file a visa application for your mother? And your kids can’t grow up knowing their grandparents?
Family & Diversity Immigrants Are Far Better Educated Than U.S.-Born Americans (Cato Institute, 1/25/18)
“Not only are many of them educated, they are generally much better educated than U.S.-born Americans are. Nearly half of all diversity and family-sponsored immigrants who arrived in 2015 had college degrees. Diversity and family-sponsored immigrants were 62 percent more likely than U.S.-born natives to have graduated college. At the same time, they are no more likely to have dropped out of high school than natives.”
The White House is trying to force Democrats to choose between current immigrants and future ones (Vox, 1/26/18)
“Future immigrants would be huge losers under this proposal. Not only would family members who weren’t spouses or minor children have no way to settle in the US, but the framework appears to propose serious restrictions in asylum law for people (especially children and families) trying to come to the US for humanitarian reasons.”
The Myth of Chain Migration (Politico, 1/26/18)
“[B]ack in 1988, the federal agency then known as the General Accounting Office found that the immigration system’s waiting lists make chain migration a theory that doesn’t really happen in practice. This is because each link in the chain takes years—and sometimes decades—to complete. Bluntly put, America isn’t being overrun by Chinese- and Mexican-born grandmas.
“The GAO made this judgment because, back in the late ’80s, the waiting list for a typical family visa was six to 12 years, depending on the country. Now those waiting lists are much longer. It takes five years for your Chinese spouse to become a U.S. citizen and petition for his sister. The family visa system is badly backlogged; the U.S. is currently processing sibling visa requests for China that were filed in 2004, making the total wait for a visa just shy of two decades. For Mexico and the Philippines, the total wait now exceeds 25 years.
“Chain migration, put another way, is a myth—it takes too long for a chain to form.”
And in other news
Migrants from Latin America and the Caribbean sent a record amount of money to their home countries in 2016 (Pew Research, 1/23/18)
“Globally, migrants sent an estimated $574 billion to their home countries in 2016, a 1.4% drop from 2015. But in Latin America and the Caribbean – together making up a region where many people say economic conditions are bad – remittances rose to $74.3 billion, a 7.4% increase from the previous year ($69.2 billion). …
“Remittances are funds or other assets sent by migrants via formal channels such as banks. The total amount of money transferred is likely significantly larger than what is reported, because these estimates do not include the transfer of other assets, such as gifts, or informal monetary transfers….
“As a share of total economic output (measured in gross domestic product), remittances were equivalent to 29.4% of Haiti’s 2016 GDP…”
Under Trump, Asylum Seekers Increasingly Face Criminal Charges (Huffington Post, 1/18/18)
“The Trump administration is increasingly hauling asylum-seekers into criminal courts and slapping them with convictions for illegally crossing the border, instead of sending them to immigration judges to hear their claims, according to a new report from the nonprofit group Human Rights First….
““This administration has been painting asylum-seekers and really all immigrants as criminals,” Olga Byrne, one of the report’s authors, told HuffPost. “And by referring people for prosecution ― including people who previously had no contact with the criminal justice system ― the administration is essentially creating the kinds of statistics they want to put out to the public, that immigrants are criminals.”
Federal judge claims jurisdiction over Somali deportation case (MPR, 1/26/18)
“Based on the unique circumstances of this case, including the botched flight, the resulting news coverage, and escalation of violence in Somalia, the Court finds it has limited jurisdiction to ensure Petitioners are able to exercise rights afforded to them under U.S. law,” Gayles wrote in his ruling on Friday….
“The Court finds troubling that the government would seek to immediately re-remove Petitioners when their claims arose, in great part, from the government’s own alleged misconduct,” Gayles wrote. “Petitioners cannot effectively pursue motions to reopen from Somalia where they would likely be forced underground to avoid persecution immediately upon arrival. The Court is unpersuaded by the government’s position that Petitioners can meaningfully pursue a motion to reopen from Somalia. It is unclear how Petitioners could access their immigration files or witnesses in the United States with relevant information pertaining to the December 7th flight, all the while attempting to avoid persecution in Somalia.”
Immigration news 