President Joe Biden has a border blind spot, as his latest foray into immigration policy shows. Border management is important, yes, but it is not the only immigration issue of national importance. Long-term undocumented immigrants who have worked, paid taxes, started businesses, and built families in this country over years, and even decades, have become invisible—left out—of the national immigration discussion. That is a policy and political blunder the administration should correct, with the same (or more) energy it brought to the failed border enforcement debate.
We applauded the Biden administration for welcoming Afghan refugees fleeing the Taliban, and Ukrainian immigrants escaping the Russian invasion, through a policy known as "parole." We cheered the extension of this policy to some people from Venezuela, Nicaragua, Cuba, Haiti, and Ecuador. But what about our friends and family members born in Mexico and other countries, who have already embraced the United States as home? When will federal policy "embrace" and recognize them?
Presidents have had the legal authority to grant immigration "parole" to individuals since 1952, and every single president—Republican and Democrat—has used it. Parole is a policy that can and should be extended to people from Mexico and other countries who have contributed to the U.S. for decades. Right now, their work is accepted but their existence ignored. And the Biden administration is on the back foot, responding to its opponents' priorities rather than charting its own.
Instead of showing political courage and human decency by embracing long-term undocumented Americans, the focus in Washington continues to be on partisan activities like the impeachment of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas by the Republicans in the House, or fruitless negotiations on border issues that Republicans admit they do not want to resolve.
How ironic it was to see President Biden standing in front of a photo of Abraham Lincoln, forcefully calling out the Republican Party and former President Donald Trump for sabotaging a bill they insisted on using as a vehicle for border restrictions. Donald Trump, Biden said would "rather weaponize this issue than actually solve it. ... Frankly [the Republicans in Congress] owe it to the American people to show some spine and do what they know to be right."
"What's right" is acknowledging that there are long-term residents in the United States who have worked, built businesses, and paid taxes for years—all while wondering if, or when, they will lose it all because they are undocumented and could be deported. They are valued members of our communities and multi-generational families, including people with Temporary Protected Status (TPS) and Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), lawful permanent residents, and U.S. citizens. Their families and communities are angry that this country gratefully accepts their contributions, but continues to deny them security and dignity.
Extending work permits is overwhelmingly popular among Americans generally, and supported by half of Republican voters. If the president and the Democrats used a fraction of the energy they put into the border bill to deliver work permits for long-term residents, imagine how different things would be. Our loved ones would finally have the stability they deserve and need. And the president would retake control of the immigration debate, forcing his political opponents to respond to him, rather than the other way around.
Let recent history be a guide. In 2012, then-Vice President Biden saw, up close, what happens when you stand up for people who have given so much to this country. He stood beside President Barack Obama's decision to create DACA, one of the shrewdest policy and political moves of this century.
Many of President Obama's political advisors argued against a policy like DACA for years, counseling him to take the "safer" route. But what seems safer to some can be infinitely more dangerous to people whose lives are on the line. Immigrant youth taught this to the Obama-Biden administration in 2012. They won a policy change that stabilized their lives, and with 58 percent of Latin voters at that time saying the act made them "more enthusiastic" about the president, showed the entire country that elections are won through courage, not cowardice.
Today, some 11.3 million U.S. citizens share a home with someone who is undocumented, many in key electoral states like Nevada, Arizona, Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Georgia, and North Carolina. And President Biden is facing a clear enthusiasm gap, just like Obama did before DACA. Immigration is an existential issue for these families and our country.
President Biden invested a huge amount of political capital to push forward the $14 billion border bill that failed, as it should. Now is the time for the Biden administration to move off of its political opponents' priorities, and extend parole to long-term U.S. residents without papers—most but not all of whom are Mexican Americans. Parole is already available for the spouses and parents of U.S. service members. The president himself has pointed out that immigrants with legal work permits help ease U.S. labor shortages, and mayors, governors, and most Americans agree.
It's time to take your own advice, Mr. President, and do "what is right."
Sergio Suárez is CEO of North American Institute for Mexican Advancement (NAIMA), and a member of the American Business Immigration Coalition (ABIC).
Pedro Zamora is the president of Zamora entertainment, Inc., and board member of Promotores U.S.A., the largest promoters of Latin Music in the United States.
The views expressed in this article are the writers' own.
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