The new President of the United States, Joe Biden, had promised change after four years of Trump administration. One of his first decisions in this direction concerns immigration, Donald Trump’s hobbyhorse, who notably ordered the construction of a wall between the United States and Mexico.
Joe Biden will ask his government, Tuesday, February 2, to facilitate the naturalization procedures which concern nine million migrants who can claim American citizenship. The Democratic president must also order a review of all the obstacles to legal immigration and integration posed by his predecessor. In particular the so-called rule “The burden for society”, created in August 2019 to deny the green card or American citizenship to migrants receiving social assistance and which had been denounced by a senior Democratic official as “A wealth test for migrants”.
Three decrees to reconnect with the welcoming tradition
This is one of three presidential decrees Joe Biden is due to sign on Tuesday afternoon. The second concerns the establishment of a working group responsible for reuniting the families of migrants, separated by the policy of ” zero tolerance “ on the border with Mexico adopted by the Trump administration in 2018. Faced with the outcry it had sparked, the Republican government had given up but hundreds of children have never found their parents.
The third, finally, must allow the return of economic aid to the countries of origin of migrants and also aims to restore legal immigration channels at the source, such as those which made it possible under Barack Obama to bring in hundreds of minors. whose parents were already in the United States.
Senior government officials have announced that this should lead to “Radical policy changes”. Mr. Biden’s strategy “Is based on the basic premise that [le] country is safer, stronger and more prosperous with a healthy, rational and humane migration system ”, they further explained at a press conference, before the signing of these three decrees.
As pledges to the left wing of the Democratic Party, they are part of a series of measures intended to reconnect with the tradition of welcoming the United States. Joe Biden has already overturned two key decisions of the Trump administration: the construction of a wall on the border with Mexico has been interrupted and the ban on entry to United States soil for nationals of countries of faith predominantly Muslim was lifted.
