On October 4, 2024, the Biden administration announced that it was ending an immigration parole program that gave legal protections to immigrants from four countries. At the time, it was unclear how many people in New York would be affected.
The CHNV parole program, which covers Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela, has expired only weeks before the Nov. 5 presidential election, when immigration and border security have been major concerns. Although the measure may keep many more families apart, it is predicted that it will directly affect 500,000 people in the country.
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The program’s termination “will put the lives of as many as 530,000 people at risk,” according to a statement made by Murad Awawdeh, president and CEO of the organization New York Immigration Coalition.
Awawdeh stated, “By not extending their parole, President Biden is turning his back on individuals who have become a fabric of their communities — working, paying taxes, and contributing to the country’s economy.”
“Without parole extensions, these individuals will face the reality of losing their legal ability to work, unable to support themselves or their families.”
A representative with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services verified the program’s termination, stating that it was always meant to be a temporary measure when it was first introduced two years ago.
In an August letter to Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, Republican House Homeland Security Committee members stated that “a Department investigation recently revealed large amounts of fraud among applications for prospective sponsors in the CHNV program.”
The House Republican Party tweeted, “Shut it down permanently,” in response to the uproar.
Reps. Anthony D’Esposito and Andrew Garbarino, both Republicans on the House Homeland Security Committee and representatives of Long Island did not immediately react to inquiries on the scheduled termination of the program.
According to Cornell Law School professor of immigration law practice Stephen Yale-Loehr, one of the goals of the CHNV parole program was “to try to relieve some pressure on the U.S.-Mexico border.”
He noted, “So the people would be coming legally if they could have a financial sponsor in the United States, rather than illegally and taking their chances, risking that dangerous journey.”
Yale-Loeher added, “But it is temporary and it has worked to reduce the number of illegal entries at the border.”
The decision to terminate the initiative may have been influenced by additional considerations, according to Yale-Loehr, such as claims that the Venezuelan economy is strengthening.
The effectiveness of the measure has been mentioned by the US Department of Homeland Security. According to a statement DHS released on its website, in July 2024, U.S. Border Patrol interactions with citizens of CHNV were 98% lower than in December 2022, before the full implementation of parole procedures for these countries.
Many parole candidates allegedly tried to manipulate the system, according to a letter from the House Homeland Security Committee in August. According to the letter, an internal DHS inquiry discovered that 100 physical locations were given for parole sponsors on distinct application forms; these addresses appeared on over 19,000 applications, ranging in frequency from 124 to 739 times.
The committee letter went on to say, “The internal investigation also purportedly reveals that 2,839 sponsor forms contained non-existent zip codes and 4,590 forms were filled out with Alien file numbers that had never been issued by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.”
Furthermore, as stated in the committee letter, “3,218 serial sponsors (sponsors who appeared on 20 or more forms)” had completed 100,948 forms.
A parole program may go awry for several reasons, according to Dara Lind, a senior scholar at the nonprofit American Immigration Council.
“And so it would not be surprising if one of the unintended consequences here were a greater extent of fraud than we’re used to seeing, which is usually very, very, very, very low,” Lind stated.
It was impossible to determine if the program’s termination was due to political motives, she continued, “Unfortunately, the government has been really, really not transparent about this,” Lind said, noting “there was no communication” from the Biden administration about whether it would renew the program.
