WASHINGTON: President-elect of the United States Joe biden will work to provide a roadmap to US citizenship for nearly 11 million undocumented immigrants, including more than 500,000 from India, and will also set a minimum number of admission of 95,000 refugees a year.
As a predominantly immigrant community, but in some cases with American roots stretching back generations, Indian-Americans know firsthand the strength and resilience immigrants bring to the United States of America, according to a document. policy issued by the Biden campaign.
“He (Biden) will immediately begin working with Congress to pass legislative immigration reform that modernizes our system, with a priority on keeping families together by providing a roadmap to citizenship for nearly 11 million undocumented immigrants, including over 500,000 from India. ” He said.
The Biden administration will support family-based immigration and preserve family unification as a central tenet of the United States’ immigration system, which includes reducing the backlog of family visas, he said.
“And he will increase the number of refugees we welcome into this country by setting the annual global target for refugee admissions at 125,000 and seek to increase it over time in accordance with our responsibility, our values, and unprecedented global need. He will too. it will work with Congress to establish a minimum number of admissions of 95,000 refugees a year, “the policy document said.
Biden will eliminate uncertainty for Dreamers by reinstating the DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals) program and will explore all legal options to protect their families from inhumane separation. And it will end workplace raids and protect other sensitive places from immigration enforcement actions, he said.
Launched by the Obama administration, DACA is an immigration policy that allows some people with an illegal presence in the U.S. After being brought into the country as children to receive a two-year renewable period of deferred action of deportation and are eligible for a work permit. In the US DACA recipients are often called Dreamers. To be eligible for the program, beneficiaries cannot have felony or felony misdemeanors on their records.
The Trump administration took steps to end the DACA program in 2017, and was ultimately prevented from doing so by the Supreme Court this year. Still, his administration scaled down the program and vowed to end it, leaving thousands of program beneficiaries in limbo.
Biden will also restore and defend the naturalization process for green card holders, according to the policy document.
Employment-based visas, also known as green cards, allow migrants to obtain lawful permanent residence in the US to perform skilled work.
“He (Biden) will increase the number of visas offered for work-based permanent immigration based on macroeconomic conditions and exempt recent graduates of doctoral programs in STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math )”, said.
“It will first support the reform of the temporary visa system for highly skilled skilled jobs to protect wages and workers, then it will expand the number of visas offered and remove the limits on employment-based green cards per country, which have kept the so many Indian families expecting too much, “the document says.
The Biden administration, he said, will also repeal the president Donald trump“Muslim ban”.
President Trump had imposed a controversial travel ban, which critics often refer to as a “Muslim ban,” in several Muslim-majority countries, including Iran and Syria, through a series of executive orders.
“Biden will overturn Trump’s ‘Muslim ban’ from day one and reverse damaging asylum policies that are causing chaos and a humanitarian crisis on our border,” the policy document said.
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