Restricting Immigration Parole is a Lose-Lose-Lose

We hope this information provides helpful context as the Senate immigration negotiations continue. As always, if you are working on a related story or require expert analysis or data on immigration policy and its implications, please don’t hesitate to reach out to our team at FWD.us.

As Senate negotiations over major immigration restrictions continue, I wanted to make sure you had our latest write-up explaining why restricting immigration parole is a lose-lose-lose: terrible for vulnerable people seeking refuge, terrible because it will push more people between ports of entry and create more chaos between ports of entry, and terrible because it will lead to worse politics for Democrats in 2024.

Restricting the President’s parole authority would be a terrible mistake. It will not only cause lasting damage to the immigration system for decades to come, but it will spur more chaos at the border in 2024. That’s why some Republicans are demanding it.

The immigration parole authority is a foundational tool used by every president in the last 70 years to manage border and national security needs, and to provide relief for individuals who are fleeing danger or persecution. It is used on a daily basis by CBP and ICE to improve orderly border processing, work to manage conditions in DHS facilities, facilitate national security investigations, and more. The authority has also been used as a critical foreign policy tool to protect Soviet Jews fleeing persecution, Cubans in the Cold War, Ukrainians and Afghans. Not only would restricting parole authority slash a life-saving, foundational legal immigration tool for decades to come, but doing so would– by design– take away a key border security tool to spur more chaos at the border in 2024, hurting Democrats politically in the months ahead.

In the past two years, the Uniting for Ukraine program, and the Cuba, Nicaragua, Haiti and Venezuela individualized parole programs have become one of the Biden administration’s most successful border security tools that has significantly reduced pressure on the border by providing a safe legal option for over a quarter million people to come to the U.S., as long as they can secure a private financial sponsor and do not have the take the dangerous journey to the border. Any efforts to end this would likely increase unlawful migration to the border and result in more asylum seekers lacking critical work authorization entering the United States.

The massive parole restrictions being demanded would:

Roll back Biden administration’s progress in building legal pathways away from the border that reduce chaos: The Biden administration made clear how parole authority to can reduce unauthorized migration from certain countries — Ukraine, Cuba, Nicaragua, Haiti, and Venezuela — resulting in thousands of people safely entering the U.S. if they can secure an American sponsor who can financially support them.

Push more people to cross between ports of entry, since the unauthorized border crossings from countries eligible for sponsorship-based parole have plummeted:

Down ~50% for Venezuela
Down a stunning 90% to 99% for Cubans, Nicaraguans and Haitians

This is huge progress–no other tool has had nearly the effect on reducing unauthorized crossings. And would be totally undone.