The Trump administration proposes to terminate temporary legal status for 530,000 migrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela, beginning April 24. This terminates a two-year parole program created by Biden, which permitted entrance with U.S. sponsors. Trump has pushed tougher immigration enforcement, including record deportations, and claims these initiatives went beyond federal law.
On March 6, Trump declared that he would make a decision “very soon” on whether to deny parole to over 240,000 Ukrainians who escaped to the United States during the war with Russia. Trump’s comments followed a Reuters story claiming that his administration intended to strip Ukrainians of their status as early as April.
- Advertisement -
In 2022, Biden started a parole entrance program for Venezuelans, and in 2023, he extended it to Cubans, Haitians, and Nicaraguans as his government struggled with substantial illegal immigration from those countries. There has been tension in the four nations’ diplomatic and political ties with the US.
As Biden attempted to crack down on unauthorized border crossings between the United States and Mexico, new legal routes were established.
Many migrants may be at risk of deportation if they decide to stay in the United States after the Trump administration decided to deny them legal status. The number of people who came to the United States on parole and currently have some kind of legal status or protection is still unknown.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security stated in a notice scheduled to formally appear in the Federal Register on Monday that the migrants’ parole status would be revoked, which would facilitate their placement in “expedited removal,” an expedited deportation procedure.
Certain migrants in the United States may be subject to accelerated removal for two years or less under a Trump-era regulation that was put into effect in January.
