Biden’s policies ‘undermine the immigration laws Congress has passed, and they have eroded the rule of law at our southern border,’ the senators wrote.
A group of Republican senators is asking the Biden administration to reconsider its executive order granting amnesty to the illegal immigrant spouses of U.S. citizens.
Senators John Cornyn (R., Texas) and James Lankford (R., Okla.) led a group of over a dozen Republican senators who wrote a letter to President Joe Biden last week urging him to “rescind” his parole program for illegal immigrant spouses of American citizens.
“Under your Administration, the parole authority has been unlawfully used to circumvent screening and vetting, mass parole of illegal aliens after the cartels surge caravans at the border, and to circumvent normal refugee processing. These actions undermine the immigration laws Congress has passed, and they have eroded the rule of law at our southern border,” the senators wrote.
“Border security is national security, and our adversaries will continue to take advantage of the chaos your Administration created by announcing this policy. We urge you to rescind this policy immediately and focus your efforts on securing our border against the cartels and adversaries who will welcome this chaos.”
The letter was also signed by Senators Thom Tillis (R., N.C.), John Thune (R., S.D.), Mitt Romney (R., Utah), Ted Budd (R., N.C.), Mike Rounds (R., S.D.), Roger Wicker (R., Miss.), Kevin Cramer (R., N.D.), John Kennedy (R., La.), Shelley Moore Capito (R., W.Va.), Joni Ernst (R., Iowa), Deb Fischer (R., Neb.), John Hoeven (R., N.D.), Jim Risch (R-Idaho), and Mike Crapo (R-Idaho).
Lankford played a key role in negotiating a bipartisan immigration deal earlier this year that failed to make it out of the senate because of strong conservative opposition.
Conservative lawmakers and legal organizations are already preparing to mount legal and political challenges to Biden’s executive order on constitutional grounds. An estimated 500,000 people could potentially benefit from Biden’s newest executive order.
The White House announced the mass amnesty program on the 12th anniversary of former president Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals executive order giving deportation protections to people who came to America illegally as children.
DACA continues to face legal challenges, although it has survived up to this point. In May, the White House announced a plan to allow DACA recipients to become eligible for healthcare coverage under Obamacare.
Illegal immigration is a major liability for the Biden administration because of widespread dissatisfaction with the record amounts of people crossing the southern border illegally. In an attempt to change public opinion, Biden recently signed an executive order limiting the amount of illegal immigrants eligible to receive asylum.