By
The Associated Press
US President Joe Biden is closing in on a deal on border security and funding for Ukraine in the Senate as the White House tries to resolve one of the main hurdles: whether to preserve presidential authority allowing immigrants to enter United States in special cases of emergencies or international conflicts.
The Republican opposition criticizes this presidential authority known as
parole
, considering it a maneuver by the Biden Government that allows Congress to be evaded and paves the way for an immense number of immigrants to enter the United States, still overloading an immigration system that does not provide supply.
But this Government measure that allows the legal arrival of certain immigrants at certain specific times is not new.
It has been used for decades by different administrations to authorize the arrival of immigrants, from Hungarians in the 1950s and Vietnamese in the 1970s, to Iraqi Kurds in the 1990s. For all those who receive this benefit, it can represent a complete change in their lives, a lifesaver.
“The
parole
gave me this opportunity, it has made me realize my dreams, my life,” said Emilia Ferrer Triay, who arrived from Cuba in 1980, when she was 13 years old.
“Everything changed from the day I arrived.
“I saw that I had a future, that I was going to be able to live here… that there were no restrictions.”
Ferrer, his younger brother and his uncles were rescued from the sea after the fishing boat they were traveling in sank in the Atlantic while they were trying to get from Cuba to Key West, at the southern tip of Florida.
They were part of a massive emigration of more than 125,000 Cubans who left the Cuban port of Mariel for the United States in 1980.
[Biden says he is willing to make “massive changes” to the border and asylum system]
The 57-year-old says that from the beginning she had the opportunity to go to school, learn English and then study at university.
She works full time, is married and has three American children.
She also became a citizen of the United States eight years after arriving in this country.
“I would be very unhappy if I had had to stay in Cuba,” he said.
“You have no future, you cannot dream.
Here I have been able to do everything.”
Immigration: a core issue for the 2024 elections
Republican senators have refused to approve any additional aid for Ukraine or Israel if there are no changes to border policies.
Negotiations have been stalled for weeks, but both sides have said they are getting closer to a deal and the Senate could consider the bill as soon as next week.
Biden told reporters Thursday: “I don't think we have any sticking points left yet.”
“I think they are certainly getting closer to the issue of the language that needs to be addressed about
parole
,” Republican Senator John Thune said in Congress on Thursday.
“And in a way that limits abuse of authority.
"We'll wait and see what it's like when the text comes out, but I think a lot of these questions will hopefully be answered."
In recent days, negotiators have discussed possible compromises, including capping the number of migrants eligible for
parole
, according to two people familiar with the negotiations who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
Sen. James Lankford, the Republican's top negotiator, said Thursday that he wanted to make sure the president had to report the number of migrants getting
parole
.
“We have to have greater supervision,” he said.
American voters are increasingly concerned about the issue of immigration and it is expected to be a major issue in the 2024 presidential elections. The Biden administration has been heavily criticized by the Republican opposition, which maintains that its policies have encouraged the arrival illegal movement of more and more migrants across the border with Mexico.
“For the American people, what the Biden Administration is doing is illegal.
It is encouraging illegal immigration,” said Republican Senator Lindsey Graham.
He described
parole
as the “favorite tool” of the Democratic administration that has allowed too many people to enter the United States.
The legal battle over
Biden's humanitarian
parole
But the U.S. immigration system has been broken for years, and every passing administration has tested the limits of its executive authority while Congress has refused to act.
The Biden administration's approach — to curb illegal border entry while opening new legal avenues for some immigrants with sponsors to arrive by plane — is the latest in a series of attempts to clean up the country's immigration system.
Biden's presidential authority is known as
parole
, or conditional release, because otherwise migrants would remain detained while their cases are heard in immigration courts.
Through this measure, they are allowed to legally enter the United States.
Although it is also a conditional release, it has nothing to do with the conditional release that a person obtains in the criminal system after having completed a prison sentence.
During the Biden Administration, the United States has made extensive use of the humanitarian
parole
system .
The United States flew about 80,000 Afghans from Kabul after the Taliban came to power.
It has also admitted tens of thousands of Ukrainians who fled after the Russian invasion.
In January 2023, the Democratic Administration announced a plan to admit 30,000 Cubans, Nicaraguans, Venezuelans and Haitians each month, as long as they have a financial sponsor and arrive by plane instead of crossing the land border with Mexico.
For this process, they created a mobile application where people can request from another country to come to the United States, instead of traveling directly without that authorization.
The state of Texas sued the federal government to stop the program, claiming in part that it was bringing too many people to the border.
Republican senators have also criticized him.
Democratic senators and immigration activists, however, maintain that
parole
is a valuable tool for people fleeing dangerous situations in their countries and for controlling the border.
Before the program existed, migrants from those nations represented the vast majority of people entering the United States illegally, but since its implementation the number of migrants from those nationalities who are detained has fallen drastically.
“That's an important model for the future that we've also seen reduce congestion at the border,” said Andrea Flores, who worked as a policy adviser in the administrations of Presidents Barack Obama and Biden, and is now vice president of FWD.us. , a non-governmental organization that advocates for immigrants.
A resource that has helped hundreds of thousands of immigrants
Over the years, the tool has been used to offer safe and quick shelter to immigrants.
Biden administration officials are reluctant to abandon it not only now, but also in the future.
“It is very important to understand that it is currently used as a way for the Administration to better manage the flow of people at the border, in a planned manner,” said Senator Chris Murphy, the top Senate Democrat in the negotiations.
Political journalist Marcelo Conde fled Nicaragua in 2023 after receiving death threats for not supporting leftist President Daniel Ortega.
He feared that if he left his country legally, showing his passport at the airport, he would be detained and imprisoned.
Marcelo Conde in his apartment on Wednesday, January 17, 2024 in Las Vegas, Nevada.John Locher / AP
That's why she left across the land border to Honduras, then passed through El Salvador and Costa Rica, and applied to the program with the sponsorship of her godmother.
“The
parole
became an opportunity, but also a dichotomy because it was not approved quickly,” said Conde, 34, in a recent telephone interview from his home in Las Vegas.
“It was more than 100 days of waiting,” she explained.
Shortly after arriving in the United States, he obtained a work permit and is living in Las Vegas, where he works in a restaurant.
Conde speaks Spanish, French and English, and hopes to soon be able to work as a journalist.