Washington — A gaggle of Senate Democrats is urgent President Biden to work to “defend immigrant households” within the remaining weeks of his presidency, with President-elect Donald Trump set to take workplace subsequent month.
“As Senators who signify numerous states throughout our nation and who collectively signify thousands and thousands of immigrant households, we write to precise our deep concern concerning the menace the incoming administration poses to immigrants in our communities,” the group of senators, led by Democratic Whip Dick Durbin of Illinois, wrote in a letter to the president Monday.
The senators cited Trump’s menace of mass deportations that they are saying will “jeopardize the security and safety” of thousands and thousands of households, “sow deep mistrust and concern” within the communities and “destabilize the U.S. economic system.” And so they urged Mr. Biden to take various actions upfront of Trump’s inauguration, stressing that the “window to safe and finalize your administration’s insurance policies is closing quickly.”
“We urge you to behave decisively between now and the inauguration of the President-elect to finish the essential work of the previous 4 years and defend immigrant households,” Durbin stated within the letter, which was additionally signed by Sens. Cory Booker of New Jersey, Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada, Tammy Duckworth of Illinois, Mazie Hirono of Hawaii, Ben Ray Luján of New Mexico and Alex Padilla of California.
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Among the many requests, the group requested the president to prioritize redesignating and lengthening Momentary Protected Standing for all eligible international locations, which permits migrants from international locations experiencing unsafe situations to legally reside within the U.S. The group additionally requested the president to expedite the processing of profit requests for recipients of DACA, this system for tons of of hundreds of undocumented immigrants who had been delivered to the U.S. as kids and have been granted safety from deportation.
The push comes as Trump has made clear his intention to pursue a radical shift on immigration coverage, which turned a key a part of his marketing campaign as he promised to focus on each unauthorized and authorized immigrants with unprecedented measures.
In an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that aired Sunday, reiterated various the pledges, together with that he is “completely” nonetheless planning to finish birthright citizenship on Day Certainly one of his presidency. He additionally made clear that he plans to hold out his mass deportations pledge, starting with criminals.
When requested by host Kristen Welker whether or not it is attainable to deport everybody who’s within the U.S. illegally, Trump responded that “you don’t have any selection.” He stated his administration can be “beginning with the criminals” earlier than others, noting that “we’ll see the way it goes.”
On DACA recipients, referred to as Dreamers, Trump stated he would work with Democrats on a plan, claiming that “Republicans are very open to the Dreamers.”
“I would like to have the ability to work one thing out,” Trump stated, whereas indicating that he needs the DACA recipients to have the ability to keep. Legislative efforts to codify the DACA program have failed for greater than a decade, and Republican-led states have filed quite a few lawsuits over time arguing this system is unconstitutional. The president-elect tried to finish this system throughout his first administration.
On immigrant households extra broadly, Trump emphasised that he would not “need to be breaking apart households,” saying that “the one approach you do not break up the household is you retain them collectively and you need to ship all of them again.”
Of their letter, the senators famous that whereas they help “commonsense” border safety measures, they “will proceed to oppose any insurance policies that contradict our nation’s core values.”
contributed to this report.
