Following the inauguration of President-elect Joseph R. Biden and Vice President-Elect Kamala D. Harris, there are a number of actions and issues, like COVID-19 and the U.S. economy, that will preoccupy the executive branch in the first couple of weeks. However, the upcoming administration has stated and is expected to start tackling their immigration agenda and undo the Trump administration’s policies. The trump administration has enacted more than 400 policy changes to the immigration legal system in the past four years, some which include:
- Family Separation
- Travel Ban
- Construction of Southern Border Wall
- Moves to Abolish DACA
It could take months or even years to undo these policies, but there is a great possibility of Biden implementing executive orders to tackle some of these issues. However, the majority of the success of these immigration policies depend on Congress and the Courts. So far, the Biden-Harris administration has pledged to:
- Remove roadblocks to naturalization for green card holders
- Launch a coordinated federal effort to help new Americans integrate into the economy
- Streamline both high-skilled and seasonal employment-based visa programs
- Foreign PhD graduates to receive a green card along their diploma
- STEM graduates to be exempted from caps on employment-based visas
- Restore 640,000 undocumented immigrations, aka DREAMers, their status
- Implement a 100-day freeze deportations and “collateral arrests”
Until then, the Biden-Harris team is working on the transfer of power between administrations, despite President Trump’s refusal to concede the election.
