During a House Oversight Committee hearing on Tuesday, Rep. Brandon Gill (R-Texas) discussed what he labeled as President Joe Biden’s “backdoor amnesty” affecting over a million undocumented immigrants in the U.S.
Gill opened the session by stating, “The previous administration and the unlimited amnesty lobby have manipulated America’s immigration policies, putting foreigners ahead of American citizens for political reasons, which ultimately harms U.S. citizens.”
“The Biden administration has inundated our nation with millions of unvetted illegal immigrants from around the globe. The consequences include wage reductions for the workforce, strain on our social, educational, and healthcare systems, and a cultural transformation of the U.S.”
Gill particularly highlighted the Biden administration’s substantial increase in Temporary Protected Status (TPS), a little-known program that permits foreign nationals to stay in the U.S. without legal status if their home countries are deemed unsafe due to war or disasters.
“It was meant to be a temporary measure… yet the Biden administration has exploited it, effectively using TPS as a form of backdoor amnesty for over a million individuals who entered illegally,” Gill asserted.
Echoing his point, he mentioned the statistics: when Biden took office, there were around 410,000 individuals with TPS, but that number swelled to over a million by the end of his term.
“This encompasses countries like Burma and Ukraine in 2021, Afghanistan, Cameroon, and Ethiopia in 2022, as well as Venezuela, Haiti, and Lebanon in 2024,” he elaborated.
Gill went on to say, “Nearly half of those currently benefiting from TPS didn’t even reside in the U.S. before Biden’s presidency. Essentially, TPS has served as a conduit for four years, allowing individuals to enter our borders and granting amnesty to those we often see voting for Trump’s deportation agenda.” He also emphasized that a significant majority of TPS holders entered the U.S. illegally, citing that approximately 95% of Venezuelan TPS recipients and about 91% of Haitian TPS recipients fall into this category.
