WASHINGTON – The Biden administration, in coordination with members of Congress, unveiled a proposal Thursday containing the largest mass amnesty in American history, and numerous other provisions that would further undermine America’s immigration system and the rule of law. Heritage’s team of immigration policy experts — James Carafano, Lora Ries, Chad Wolf, Ken Cuccinelli, and Mark Morgan — released the following statement in response:
“America’s immigration policy should protect our borders, uphold our laws, and safeguard our values. Unfortunately, the Biden administration’s new amnesty proposal does the opposite. In short, it trades American interests for the far-Left’s political aspirations.
“The Biden administration and others on Capitol Hill are putting illegal immigrants above the American people – the people whose very interests they were elected to represent. And make no mistake – this is no ‘one-time amnesty.’ The administration’s radical, open-borders strategy is driving crisis-level numbers at our southern border, creating a new group who will demand amnesty in the future.
“We have seen it time and again – amnesty only begets more illegal immigration. Rather than dealing with the loopholes incentivizing illegal immigration, or pursuing further security improvements on our southern border, this administration is choosing to reward law-breaking in what appears to be an effort to reshape the American electorate in ways that benefit the radical Left and its agenda.
“Worse still, this scheme is being carried out on the backs not just of American citizens, but thousands of migrant children, as well, who have increasingly become pawns used by smugglers and human traffickers to exploit loopholes in our system and funnel hundreds of thousands of migrants to the U.S. southern border.
“The administration’s actions have already created a crisis at the border. This policy will further the humanitarian crisis, overwhelm our brave law enforcement working to uphold our laws, and forever undermine the rule of law in this country. We stand united behind the majority of the American people who support fidelity to our laws, and oppose rewarding those who break those laws. We must remove incentives to migrate illegally to the U.S., close loopholes and fix our asylum process, and make further security improvements at the border.
“If President Biden truly wants to ‘build back better,’ he will abandon this foolish dream of mass amnesty.”
For policy insights on fixing America's immigration system: An Agenda for American Immigration Reform
