Tag: U.S. immigration policy

House passes bills providing citizenship path for Dreamers, farmworkers

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House Democrats passed a pair of bills Thursday that would create a pathway to citizenship for Dreamers and some migrant farm workers, taking a piecemeal approach as the fate of President Biden’s major immigration package looks increasingly uncertain. 

The Dream and Promise Act, which passed 228-197, would provide certainty to undocumented people brought to the U.S. as children whose ability to go to school, get work and even remain in the country has hung in the balance from administration to administration. 

Sponsor Rep. Lucille Roybal-Allard (D-Calif.) called the bill “a major step in ending the veil of fear and uncertainty that has plagued the lives of our Dreamers for far too long.” Continue reading.

Biden administration eyes new housing facilities for migrant children

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The White House said Tuesday that it’s looking at new facilities to house the unaccompanied children who have arrived by the thousands in recent weeks at the southern border as the Biden administration scrambles to deal with the growing migrant crisis.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki said the administration is scouting new facilities that would enable the administration to move thousands of children out of temporary Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) facilities and into housing managed by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), where children would have access to education, health care and legal services.

“We’re looking at additional facilities where we can safely house children and ensure they have access to all of these resources,” Psaki said. Continue reading.

More than 11,800 people in China have been diagnosed with coronavirus, the country’s health experts confirm; U.S. to deny entry to foreign nationals who recently visited China and quarantine returning Americans

Washington Post logoThe United States announced Friday it would be taking new measures to combat a coronavirus outbreak, including denying entry to foreign nationals who had recently visited China and imposing 14-day quarantines on American citizens returning from mainland China.

More than 11,800 people have been diagnosed with the rapidly spreading virus. More than 250 have died, all of them in China. The State Department told Americans not to travel there and advised those who are already there to consider leaving.

Following a quarantine order issued Friday, which government officials said was last used in the 1960s, evacuees held at a base in California will have their movements tightly controlled for 14 days after they left China because health experts are still uncertain about how readily the virus spreads. Continue  reading.