The Biden administration said Thursday it was reinstating a controversial parole policy that allows tens of thousands of migrants into the U.S. each month. The policy was suspended last month after extensive fraud was uncovered in parts of the program.
The Department of Homeland Security announced that it would resume parole procedures for Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans (CHNVs), “incorporating additional screening of sponsors in the United States to enhance the integrity of the process.”
“With these updated procedures in place, DHS will resume issuing new advance travel authorizations and will closely monitor how this new process works going forward,” the spokesperson said.
House committee demands documents from Mayorkas after Biden administration freezes migrant flight program
Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas made the remarks during the White House daily press briefing on July 15, 2024. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
Fox News Digital first reported this month that the administration stopped issuing advance travel authorizations for the program in July. 30,000 people Migrants from those countries will be able to travel to the U.S. legally starting in early 2023 under the administration's parole system each month.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) told Fox News Digital at the time that it had stopped issuing the permits “out of an abundance of caution” and confirmed that it takes abuse of the process very seriously.
The suspension came after an internal report made public in part by the Federation for American Immigration Reform found that 100,948 applications had been filled out by 3,218 consecutive sponsors (people whose numbers appeared on 20 or more applications).
They also found that 24 of the 1,000 most frequently used numbers belonged to people who had died, while 100 addresses were used between 124 and 739 times on more than 19,000 forms. These addresses included warehouses. The focus was on issues with the applications of donors, not the applications of the program beneficiaries themselves.
'Stop it': Pressure grows to end Biden migrant flight program amid fraud revelations
On February 23, 2024, migrants who crossed the border from Mexico arrive at a makeshift camp in San Diego, California. (Qian Weizhong/VCG via Getty Images)
The Department of Homeland Security said Thursday that the new screening measures include “further scrutiny of advocates' financial records and criminal histories, additional screening to identify fraudulent advocate profiles, and enhanced screening methods to identify serial application patterns.” The department will also require advocates to be fingerprinted.
“These new procedures for sponsors, coupled with the existing rigorous screening of potential beneficiaries seeking to travel to the United States, will strengthen the integrity of these processes and help prevent exploitation of beneficiaries,” the statement said.
The Biden administration claims that the expansion of parole procedures has reduced illegal border crossings and also achieved a 98% reduction in CHNV nationals compared to December 2022.
DHS documents reveal where paroled migrants will land on Biden's controversial flight program
But Republicans have slammed the administration's use of the parole system as an abuse of the parole system, which is allowed on a case-by-case basis for urgent humanitarian reasons or significant public interest.
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House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Mark Green (R-Tenn.) said he wasn't surprised the committee was reopening despite the misconduct findings.
“The CHNV program, coupled with the use of the CBP One app at the southwest border, helps the President and border agents play a massive dummy game, encouraging inadmissible aliens to bypass ports of entry and simply cross the border at ports of entry,” he said in a statement. “My committee has consulted with the Department since this suspension was announced, and the results have been stark: instead of eliminating a clearly flawed program, the Department is allowing it to continue without rooting out fraud or putting in place adequate safeguards to prevent exploitation by sponsors inside the United States.”
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“But fundamentally, if DHS simply stopped the importation of 30,000 inadmissible aliens each month in the first place, the fraud it was meant to prevent would disappear,” he added.
