White House’s Reported Ill-Advised Green-Card Giveaway Would Exacerbate Illegal Immigration Crisis

April 8, 2024

By William Davis

As the crisis at the southern border continues to worsen and demands a real solution, the Biden Administration is considering enacting yet another amnesty program. 

The White House is reportedly considering a plan to award green cards to 4,000 illegal aliens. Those who would qualify for the program are aliens who have been in the country for at least a decade and have not been convicted of serious crimes, according to the New York Post. The rumored proposal appears to be a smaller-scale version of the DACA and DAPA programs, which the Obama Administration created by executive order, allowing millions of illegal aliens to receive benefits similar to those of U.S. citizens.  For more than a decade, DACA and DAPA have served as the twin towers of immigration lawlessness, and now the current administration appears prepared to expand and normalize executive amnesty. 

The arguments for this latest amnesty proposal will likely be similar to the ones repeated ad nauseam in favor of DACA and DAPA. Anti-border advocates will argue that the people set to benefit from this program have been in the country a long time, have become part of their community and that it would be cruel to make them return to their home countries. This argument, taken to its logical conclusion, would allow anybody who arrives in the country illegally and stays here long enough to remain here forever and eventually gain citizenship. Of course, this is the endgame for the administration and their extremist allies in the illegal immigration lobby.

It’s why on their very first day in office, the Biden Administration sent a proposal to Congress that would have led to a path to citizenship for tens of millions of illegal aliens currently residing in the country. The White House can cloak these proposals in whatever feel-good veneer they want, but they have made clear that the core principle of their immigration policy is citizenship for anyone who comes to the country illegally. Aspiring migrants are not dumb and understand full well that if they make it past the dangerous trek through Central America, they will be allowed to stay and have access to all sorts of benefits they would not be able to receive in their home countries. This is the principle reason why more than seven million illegal aliens have crossed the U.S. border under this administration’s watch and the number of illegal aliens coming every month continues to climb. 

Beyond furthering this perverse incentive structure, another issue with the administration’s green card proposal is the requirement that beneficiaries have not been convicted of a serious crime. While nobody wants to see someone who has been convicted of a serious crime given a green card, what constitutes a serious crime to most people and what constitutes a serious crime to the powers currently in charge may differ. 

For example, while the average American would likely consider drunk driving disqualifying for a foreign national seeking to remain in the country, this administration may not see it that way. Illegal alien crime is on the rise across the country, with women in Georgia and Michigan having been murdered, allegedly at the hands of illegal aliens in recent months. The notion that we can reward illegal immigration without harming public safety or damaging the rule of law is farcical. Lawlessness begets lawlessness, and a government willing to bend the law to accommodate immigration lawlessness is a government that will have no qualms about bending other areas of the law as well.  

It’s been roughly two months since reports emerged that the Biden Administration was considering an executive order to reduce the flow of illegal aliens at the border, but no such order ever came. Instead, it appears that the only executive order the White House is seriously considering is one that would give green cards to thousands of illegal aliens. As my organization has pointed out, the administration has long-standing federal law and Supreme Court precedent on its side if it wishes to take executive action to secure the border. However, instead of enforcing the law to deter illegal immigration, this administration appears prepared to stretch the law to encourage more of it. 

A green card giveaway on the scale being proposed would be another slap in the face to the American people by a federal government that clearly views their sovereignty and security as disposable. The only result that can possibly come from continuing to reward illegal immigration is a whole lot more of it. That’s exactly what will happen if this rumored proposal is allowed to see the light of day. 

William J. Davis is a communications associate for the Immigration Reform Law Institute, a public interest law firm working to defend the rights and interests of the American people from the negative effects of mass migration.

Also published at Daily Caller, April 5, 2024.