While President Donald Trump is reportedly set to ask Congress for another $8.6 billion to help secure the Southwest U.S. border against rampant illegal immigration, House Democrats, on the other hand, have announced an expanded “DREAM Act” of sorts that would grant millions of illegal aliens expanded access to taxpayer dollars and a pathway to citizenship.
And that’s just for starters.
Under the new legislation announced Tuesday, millions of illegal aliens currently enjoying deferred deportation under former President Obama’s “DREAM Act” would not only be granted expanded protections, but would also be given a new pathway to citizenship.
Not legalization – citizenship.
Under the Democrats' new and expanded rules, DREAMers would be eligible for in-state college tuition and financial aid, courtesy of the American taxpayer, while simultaneously getting new protections against deportation and a "direct" pathway to citizenship.
The bill also allows some DREAMers who’ve already been deported to return to the United States.
On top of that, the new legislation also provides a pathway to citizenship for aliens currently living in the United States under Temporary Protected Status, which allows foreign-born persons from certain countries to continue living and working in the U.S. provisionally if a major disaster or conflict in their home country impedes their ability to return.
But that continually-renewed designation, which is supposed to be temporary, has allowed some aliens to live in the U.S. for decades, even if the disaster that precluded their return happened years ago. For example, El Salvador has been under a TPS designation for the past 18 years thanks to an earthquake that occurred back in 2001. Nicaragua and Honduras have been on the list since Hurricane Mitch struck the region in 1998.
Democrats argue that many of these TPS recipients have been in the U.S. too long to send back to their home countries. Now, according to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, adding these people to the U.S. citizenship rolls – and the national voter registries – will only serve to“make America more American.”
According to the Washington Post, the new legislation paves the way to citizenship for at least 2 million people including illegal aliens and TPS designees, nearly three times the 674,900 illegal aliens enrolled in Obama’s DACA Program.