Immigration Benefits and Relief
The immigration laws and regulations provide some avenues to apply for lawful status from within the U.S. or to seek relief from deportation. The eligibility requirements for these benefits and relief can be stringent, and the immigration agencies often adopt overly restrictive interpretations of the requirements. Learn about advocacy and litigation that has been and can be undertaken to ensure that noncitizens have a fair chance to apply for the benefits and relief for which they are eligible. Providing avenues for legal status, protection, and family reunification is vital to ensuring humanitarian protection for immigrants. We are leading policy changes that open more opportunities like asylum, visas for victims of crime or human trafficking, and relief for long-term residents. Explore the resources below to learn more.
Employment Authorization Documents Adjudication Delays
Faced with increasing reports from immigration lawyers of Employment Authorization Documents adjudication delays, the Council and several partners filed this lawsuit against USCIS and DHS. Read More
Immigration Appeals Court Reverses Position on Deportation Waivers
In a decision issued last week, the Board of Immigration Appeals (BIA) reversed course and decided that a subset of Legal Permanent Residents (LPRs) who have been convicted of certain crimes may now have an opportunity to avoid deportation by proving to an immigration judge that their removal would cause… Read More
After Earthquake in Nepal, Bill Introduced to Grant Temporary Protected Status to Nepalese Nationals
One form of humanitarian assistance the United States can offer to Nepal, a country now recovering from the 7.8 magnitude earthquake that flattened buildings and killed more than 7,000 people, is temporary protected status (TPS) for Nepalese nationals who currently are in the United States. Last week, several members… Read More
How Families Are Kept Apart by Current Immigration Laws
Family reunification has stood as a central pillar of the U.S. immigration system, dating back to 1965. Despite this, a new study by researchers Maria Enchautegui and Cecilia Menjivar shows that current immigration laws actually work to keep many families apart. Not surprisingly, the authors’ analysis reveals that immigrant… Read More
The Court Decision on Deferred Action Everyone Should Be Talking About
Yesterday, in Crane v. Johnson, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals (the same court deciding whether or not to keep in place the preliminary injunction blocking the President’s executive actions) unanimously dismissed a lawsuit challenging the original 2012 Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. The court held that… Read More
Adding Up the Economic Benefits of the President’s Deferred Action Initiatives
As the Center for American Progress (CAP) points out in a new analysis, immigrants with legal status earn more than immigrants who don’t have legal status. Immigrants who earn more also buy more goods and services from U.S. businesses (not to mention paying more in taxes). And all of this extra spending creates new jobs in U.S. businesses for native-born and foreign-born workers alike. This is not a complicated economic argument to grasp. In fact, it’s common sense; workers who have legal status can change jobs more easily and don’t find themselves stuck in the lowest-wage jobs. Hence the importance of passing comprehensive immigration reform legislation—or, as a stop-gap measure until Congress gets its act together, implementing the Obama Administration’s “deferred action” initiatives. Read More
Texas Judge Places Preliminary Hold on President’s Deferred Action Initiatives, Government Likely to Counter
A Texas Judge has placed a preliminary hold on the two initiatives announced by President Obama last November that would expand the two-year-old Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) and Deferred Action for Parents of U.S. Citizens and Legal Permanent Residents (DAPA). These two programs would provide temporary relief from… Read More
Texas Decision at Odds with Legal Precedent, History and Facts on Immigration Enforcement
Washington D.C. – Late last night, a Texas judge issued a preliminary injunction that temporarily blocks the implementation of President Obama’s new deferred action initiatives. These initiatives, announced last November, came in response to more than 10 years of political stalemates and failure by Congress to address America’s broken immigration… Read More
How Leveraging Immigrants’ Skills Could Further Boost U.S. Economy
Now is certainly a good time to think about ways in which to realize the full potential of the immigrant workforce. There are more than 26 million foreign-born workers in the United States, and just over 8 million of them are unauthorized. Two-thirds of all unauthorized immigrants have… Read More
Senate Hearing Shows Deferred Action Programs are Beneficial to Social Security
The Senate Homeland Security committee on Wednesday held its first hearing about President Obama’s immigration executive actions. The hearing and the witnesses testifying focused on the “implications and unanswered questions” about the deportation relief offered to some undocumented immigrants included in the president’s actions. First, the… Read More
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