A new legal program could lead to as many as half a million of undocumented immigrants to qualify for U.S citizenship but many are waiting to apply, according to KQED News.
The Biden administration started accepting applications for the “Keeping Families Together” program earlier this month, which would allow long-term unauthorized immigrants married to U.S. citizens to become permanent legal residents.
The federal program would also enable 50,000 undocumented stepchildren of citizens of U.S citizens to pursue citizenship.
Janet Reyes is a dental assistant at an Oakland high school and a U.S.-born citizen but her husband Marco is an undocumented construction worker (his last name will not be used for safety reasons).
The married couple told KQED News that they were “beyond excited” when they heard Biden announce the program in June but were hesitant to provide the government with their personal information because they fear deportation if Donald Trump wins the upcoming November election.
“If you apply, you’re going to be added to this list. … And if the Republican wins, it might be something bad that you’re on this list,” Reyes said. “Some of my coworkers were just like, ‘I think we’re going to wait until after the election to see who wins.’”
At a recent press conference, immigration rights advocates in California encouraged people to take advantage of the policy now because a future presidential administration could end the program or challenge it in court.
“What we know is that the program exists today. … We want to make sure as many families are in the program, even as we know that there are many who see this as a threat,” said Angélica Salas, the executive director of the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights.
California is home to the largest number of undocumented individuals in the nation, according to the Sacramento Bee.
Roughly 12%, or 315,000, of those California residents are married to U.S. citizens, according to the Migration Policy Institute.
Trump has repeatedly vowed in campaign rallies to oust the over 11 million undocumented people living in the country.
But under the Biden-Harris administration, the president has also faced intense criticisms from immigration advocates for enacting a ‘draconian’ policy that strictly curbed asylum at the United States-Mexico border back in June.
The policy allowed the administration to stop processing asylum claims if the number of irregular crossings at the US-Mexico border surpasses an average of 2,500 per day for a week, according to Al Jazeera.
Azadeh Erfani, a senior policy analyst at the National Immigrant Justice Center, told Al Jazeera that Biden’s executive order violated both U.S. and international law because it sent people with viable asylum claims back to harm.
President Biden publicly dropped out of the presidential race in July and vice-president Kamala Harris has since replaced him as the Democratic presidential candidate.
Kamala Harris recently pledged to bring back the bipartisan border security bill on the final night of the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Chicago, but made no mention of creating a legal pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants.
