Joe Biden has been around a long time, which means he has been detailing his views on immigration for decades.
In 1986, during Ronald Reagan's presidency, then-Senator Biden spoke on immigration during a Senate session for the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986. talking about it as something that was stitched into the American fabric.
He supported legalization, as many in Congress did on both sides of the aisle, because it would "move a growing underclass living in the shadows into the daylight of citizenship and opportunity." He said it would allow these immigrants to "become full participants in our society, not just the object of our concern."
Now, 36 years later, Joe Biden is president, and he will face a newly divided Congress next year. Democrats and activists want him to push forward with executive actions on immigration, and are calling for lawmakers to come together on bipartisan legislation that would legalize young immigrants — as slim as those chances may appear.
At a press conference, Hector Sanchez Barba, the executive director and CEO of Mi Familia Vota, said that immigration is a "personal issue" for a community that played a pivotal role in key states in the midterms.
"This past election cycle in Arizona and Nevada the Latino community made their voices heard at the ballot box," he said. "DACA is extremely popular among Latino voters. Latino voters want to get immigration reform done. They are tired of the excuses, they want action for immigrants, now."
Sanchez Barba added that Republicans repeatedly "have killed" progress on codifying Dreamer protections, and "voters will not forget their inaction and repeated attacks on DACA."
The latter part of Sanchez Barba's statement reveals the problem for Democrats and advocates moving forward.
Even before next year and Republican control of the House, national Latino and immigration groups have been pressuring Congress to do something during the lame-duck session to provide permanent protections for Dreamers, undocumented youth brought to the country as children.
If any legislation centered on immigration is to pass in 2023, it will begin and end not with making DACA permanent, but with beefing up border security.
In a letter last week, 66 Latino leaders from organizations including Latino Victory Project, Voto Latino, Mi Familia Vota, Hispanic Federation, NALEO Education Fund, Somos Votanes and NextGen America, joined the Immigration Hub, UnidosUS and United We Dream in sending a letter to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell "urging both parties to come together and deliver a bipartisan solution" for Dreamers.
The group's policy drive was buoyed by polling in the 2022 Midterm Voter Election Poll, which contacted 12,500 people in the final days before the November election who already voted or were definitely voting, and found that voters across all racial and ethnic groups, including 82% of Latino voters, wanted Congress to take up protections along the lines of the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.
But Republicans have seized on record-high apprehensions of migrants at the border in successive years as proof that the Biden administration has lost control of the border.
The administration's efforts to wind down a Trump-era policy known as Title 42, which uses a public health rationale to provide the emergency ability for the U.S. to turn away migrants at the border, has also been stalled in separate court cases.
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday placed a temporary hold on a lower court ruling that would end the policy.
The good news for Democrats and advocates is that there is an appetite for immigration legislation, with a post-election poll conducted by Global Strategy Group (GSG) finding 69% of battleground voters support a compromise that both provides a path to citizenship for Dreamers and invests in border security.
Senator Kyrsten Sinema, the Democrat turned independent, proposed such a two-pronged approach along with Senator Thom Tillis, in a framework shared among lawmakers that would have legalized two million Dreamers in exchange for beefed up border security measures, but time ran out on the efforts, Democrats said last week.
Sergio Gonzales, the executive director of the Immigration Hub, told Newsweek he is amenable to a compromise along those lines, even if it includes robust border security measures he sees as unnecessary.
"The fact that Tillis and Sinema had a framework which was close to finalizing legislation shows there is space for a deal to be had," he said, though he blamed Republican leadership for constantly "moving the goal posts on what legislation would satisfy them. "There was $40 billion — that's billion with a 'B' — for border security, and changes to the asylum system that in some ways went too far."
Gonzales said he and allied groups will continue to push the administration to sign executive actions that could ease the hardship of a community whose lives are on a string, dependent on the outcome of court cases because Congress won't act.
"At this point Congress has failed to create protections for Dreamers and farm workers, which is a point of national shame, it's beyond frustrating," Gonzales said. "There are repercussions for communities living in limbo who are not quite sure what next year will hold."
A White House advisor told Newsweek that during the Trump administration everything became about the border, but the country can't afford to lose DACA recipients because it needs workers in the labor market.
"The conversation needs to be about what makes America unique and a beacon of hope all around the world," the source said, "which is the ability for everyone to come here and contribute."
Daniel Garza, the executive director of the conservative LIBRE Initiative, said his group has been holding meetings on the Hill with lawmakers encouraging them to get on board with compromise legislative efforts.
"I honestly think a divided government can help us get there," he said, pointing to intensifying pressure on Republicans to pass border security legislation, which they can't pass without Democratic support.
"There's no reason we can't do both," he added, noting potential border security enhancements and asylum reform, as well as a DACA and farmworker bill.
Garza said only there is only one result that is out of the question: doing nothing.
"Ignoring these things is a vote for the status quo," he said, "and the status quo is unacceptable."
Uncommon Knowledge
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
About the writer
Adrian Carrasquillo is a political reporter for Newsweek reporting on the 2020 election, who has covered national politics and Latino ... Read more
