A federal judge in Texas has temporarily blocked the Biden-Harris administration’s plan to grant legal status to noncitizens married to U.S. citizens, suspending the program for at least the next two weeks while the legal challenge is heard in court.
U.S. District Judge J. Campbell Barker granted the administrative stay after the policy was enacted by the Biden administration earlier this year. 16 states challenged the policy proposal, with Texas (one of the 16) claiming that “the state has had to pay tens of millions of dollars annually for everything from health care to law enforcement because immigrants without legal status live in the state.”
As part of the federal program announced in June, applications for citizenship could be submitted for the first time this week.
READ MORE:
Biden administration promotes naturalization for half a million immigrants with US spouses
BREAKING NEWS: 16 Republican attorneys general sue Biden administration over amnesty plan
If this rule is retained, it would provide a fast-track to citizenship for noncitizen spouses of U.S. citizens by allowing them to apply for a green card and remain in the U.S. while the naturalization process is underway. Before this rule, the naturalization process in these cases involved the spouse returning to their country of origin and waiting there until the process was completed.
Learn more about the process here:
To be eligible for the program, immigrants must have lived in the United States for at least 10 years continuously, must not pose a security threat or have a disqualifying criminal history, and must have been married to an American citizen by June 17, the day before the program was announced.
They must pay a $580 fee to apply and fill out a lengthy application that includes, among other things, a justification for why they are eligible for humanitarian parole and a long list of documents proving how long they have been in the country.
If approved, applicants have three years to apply for a constant residence permit. During this time, they can obtain a work permit. The government estimates that about 500,000 people and about 50,000 of their children are eligible.
The states challenging the recent program argue that it bypasses Congress, whose job it is to regulate such issues, and accused the Biden-Harris administration of doing so for “obvious political purposes.”
