On Wednesday this week, a bipartisan group of Senators filed
an 844 page immigration bill on the Senate floor, setting the stage for months
of public debate over the proposal.
The bill, called the Border Security, Economic Opportunity and
Immigration Modernization Act of 2013, is complicated and full of mechanisms meant
to tackle border security, the allocation of visas, methods of employment
verification and the much-debated citizenship path.
The first part of the bill focuses on border security with
the stated goal of achieving and maintaining effective control in high-risk
sectors along the Southern border. The bill would appropriate significant funding for border
security, including revamping surveillance systems and detection capabilities, hiring
additional border patrol agents, using unmanned aerial systems to patrol the
border, and erecting additional fencing.
The second part of the bill addresses legalization and legal
immigration. The bill would allow undocumented
immigrants to adjust their status to the legal status of Registered Provisional
Immigrant (RPI). An individual
would be eligible if they resided in the U.S. prior to December 31, 2011 and
maintained continuous presence since then. RPIs would have to pay a $500 penalty fee (except for DREAM
Act eligible students) and assessed taxes, in addition to the application fee. Applicants would be ineligible if
convicted of a felony, three or more misdemeanors or an offense under foreign
law; if they had unlawfully voted; or if they are inadmissible for other
criminal, national security, public health or morality grounds.
Spouses and children of people in RPI status could derive
status from the principal applicant, but would have to be living in the U.S. at
the time of application. Individuals
currently in removal proceedings and with removal orders would be allowed to
apply. Interestingly, it also
allows individuals outside of the U.S. who were previously here before December
31, 2011 and were deported for non-criminal reasons to reapply to re-enter the
U.S. as an RPI if they were the spouse, parent or childe of a U.S. Citizen or
Lawful Permanent Resident.
The proposed application period to apply for RPI status
would be 1 year with the possibility of an additional 1-year extension. RPIs would be allowed to work for any
employer and travel freely outside of the U.S. RPI status would last for a 6-year term and would be
renewable so long as the immigrant did not commit any act that would render
him/her deportable. The RPI would
have to pay another $500 fine in order to renew.
After 10 years, RPIs would be able to adjust to Lawful
Permanent Resident Status as long as they had maintained continuous physical
presence, paid all taxes owed during the period they were RPIs, worked
regularly in the U.S., demonstrated requisite knowledge of Civics and English,
and paid a $1,000 penalty. People
in DREAM Act Status and the Agricultural Program would be able to get their
green cards in 5 years. DREAM Act
children would be eligible for citizenship immediately after they got their
green cards.
The bill addresses a number of other areas of immigration
reform. It purports to eliminate
the backlog for family and employment-based immigrants. It also establishes a merit based visa
after 5 years of enactment. The
bill is far too dense to discuss it in full in this posting. It is certainly a good starting point,
but also something that needs to be discussed further, nurtured and improved
upon.
