By Maria Ortiz
Aug 23, 2024, 6:01 PM EDT
Texas and 15 other Republican-led states sued the Biden administration on Friday to stop the implementation of the new program that could give legal status to hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants who are married to U.S. citizens.
The New York Times reported the news.
The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas, seeks a temporary restraining order and a preliminary injunction to immediately suspend the program.
In court filings, the states say the program is unlawful because it exceeds the executive branch’s discretion to set policy.
Biden announced in June Two new executive measures in an election year that could provide relief to thousands of undocumented immigrants who have been in the country for several years.
The first measure aims to streamline the process through which undocumented spouses and undocumented children of U.S. citizens apply for legal permanent residence.
The policy will allow noncitizen spouses married to U.S. citizens to apply to live and work in the United States legally without having to leave the country. The applicants’ noncitizen children would also be eligible for protection.
Under current law, some undocumented immigrants must first leave the United States and apply for legal residency in their home countries when they marry a citizen. In some cases, such immigrants are barred from returning to the United States for up to 10 years.
The president also announced a second measure in June that will allow some undocumented immigrants, including some DACA recipients and so-called “Dreamers,” to obtain employment-based nonimmigrant visas more quickly, senior administration officials said.
In a statement, White House spokesman Angelo Fernandez Hernandez said that “Republican elected officials continue to demonstrate that they are more focused on playing politics than helping American families or fixing our broken immigration system.”