By Gabriella Garcia
In what is being referred to as Joe Biden’s “10-Day Blitz,” the president seeks to begin his term with a series of executive orders that would overturn many of former president Trump’s most controversial legislation decisions.
According to the Washington Post, one of Biden’s legislative proposals will be sent to Congress the day of his inauguration and includes a “heavy focus on addressing the root causes of migration from Central America.”
On Jan. 12, 2021, Vice President Kamala Harris shared the administration’s immigration policy and reform vision with Univision. Harris stated, “We are going to be proposing as our first order of business, and it will be about creating a pathway for people to earn citizenship.”
Harris believes one way to address the difficulties of obtaining citizenship in America is to significantly decrease how long applicants currently wait for the results of their status. As soon as she takes office, Harris claims the administration will focus on reducing the wait time for citizenship, currently at 13 years, to eight years.
The plan to provide a quicker route towards obtaining citizenship includes giving those eligible a temporary status for five years; granting them a green card soon thereafter (once passing various background checks); then allowing them to apply for citizenship three years later.
However, in order to avoid any rushed travels to the border, the legislation requires immigrants to have already arrived in the United States before Jan. 1, 2021.
Another main concern, not only for the public but for the administration as well, is the fate of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, also known as DACA. Former president Barack Obama passed this program into legislation by executive action in 2012, providing a path of citizenship for immigrant children who arrived in the United States before the age of 16.
The Trump administration sought to overturn every immigration policy Obama had in place and incorporated a number of anti-immigration legislation of their own — including the infamously known “Muslim Ban.”
One major decision Trump made during the second year of his presidency was rescinding the DACA program, though the Supreme Court later deemed this action unconstitutional. After the Supreme Court’s decision in 2020, DACA remained but did not accept new applications, although this has since changed.
Following the decision of Batalla Vidal v. Wolf (2020), the National Immigration Law Center reports that the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has begun to move forward with DACA applications and renewals.
The inconsistency in DACA’s status has the public demanding a more permanent option to ease the concerns of DACA recipients, and during the interview with Univision, Harris assures the administration will also “expand protections for Dreamers and DACA recipients” in their immigration bill.
Gabriella Garcia is originally from the Bay Area, California and is completing her fourth year at UC Davis as a Political Science major and Professional Writing minor.
