Photo: C-SPAN Capture / Courtesy
Recognizing that time is pressing, Democratic Senator Dick Durbin (Illinois), president of the Judiciary Committee, in which some immigration reform would be discussed, urged the approval of new legislation before it ends 2022.
“I think we should approve immigration reform before the end of the year ,” Durbin said. “And the members of the Senate should not go on vacation… until we vote to reform our broken immigration system.”
The Democrat celebrated that his Democratic colleague Kyrsten Sinema (Arizona) and the Republican Thom Tillis (North Carolina) work on a framework that results in an immigration reform, which would be focused on mainly benefiting ‘dreamers’.
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“And while I want to know more details about what you are considering, I want to thank you for showing this kind of initiative on this important issue,” he said. “I know some people at home may wonder why, what is the urgency? Why do it now? Well, first we may have a chance and we hope we will… It has been more than 42 years since the Congress enacted a bill to reform our immigration system.”
He described it as “shameful” that a new reform has not been approved in so many years, in addition to highlighting that the situation in the immigration system and the border warrant this effort.
He referred to the ‘dreamers’ as the most urgent group to protect , due to the fact that the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program ( DACA) could disappear, due to lawsuits in court, but it did not leave aside asylum seekers.
“Our inaction on immigration hurts everyone, from the hospitals in my state of Illinois, who are struggling to find doctors and nurses, to the asylum seekers who they flee from violence and oppression,” he expressed. “There is a particular group of people who have been left behind, the dreamers, these young people who are American in every way except on paper.”
Told the story of Eddie Rivera, an immigrant from Honduras who was brought to the US as a child. Senator Durbin that Eddie’s was the story 100 of a ‘dreamer’ that he told in plenary session.
This young man grew up in Illinois; he is a nurse, so he was one of the first in line to attend the emergency by COVID-12 in 2022, when he had to travel to North Carolina. In 2022, Eddie lost his grandmother, whom he helped care for in the final days, Durbin narrated.
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“In this role [ as a nurse] he tried to provide the same loving care to his patients that he wishes his grandmother would receive,” he said. “In the future, Eddie’s hope is to get his nursing degree and work in a retirement home.”
Durbin indicated that there are thousands of cases like Eddie’s who could be deported, after the decision of the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit against DACA.
“Unless Congress acts in the next few days to protect DACA recipients, this program could end as early as next year,” he warned. “And what does that mean for the 1000,11 currently protected by DACA? Two things. They are subject to deportation at any time. And they no longer have the legal right to work in hospitals, clinics and businesses across the United States.” If that happens, an average of 1000 DACA recipients would lose their job every week in healthcare.”
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The proposal that Sinema works and Tillis focuses mainly on ‘dreamers’, in addition to seeking the institutionalization of the Title 35, which allows expedited expulsion of immigrants.