Obama Immigration Law Reform

Obama Immigration Law Reform

President Barack Obama recently announced that he expects to have a new immigration law proposal in Congress by the end of the year, but that there will not be a new immigration law in effect until next year. He stated that there needs to be "a pathway to citizenship" for millions of illegal immigrants in the United States, and that the system must be reworked to avoid tensions with Mexico. Without it, he said, Mexicans will keep crossing the border in dangerous ways and employers will continue exploiting workers. "We can create a system in which you have . . . an orderly process for people to come in, but we're also giving an opportunity for those who are already in the United States to be able to achieve a pathway to citizenship so that they don't have to live in the shadows,"

This gives hope to many immigrants in the U.S., legal or illegal, documented or undocumented, as a new immigration law could effect not only the millions of illegal aliens or undocumented workers in the U.S., but also their families. Many family members of undocumented immigrants are lawful U.S. citizens, especially their U.S. born children. Even though an illegal alien may have a U.S. citizen immediate family member, the U.S. immigration law does not provide a clear path to legalization.

Under the current law, most illegal or undocumented immigrants must return to their home country before they can become legal in the United States. The problem that this creates is that once the person departs the U.S. to comply with the law, another section of the law bars them from returning for 10 years or more. Unfortunatley, many immigrants, in attempting to comply with our laws, leave the U.S. with the hope of returning through family sponsorship, only to learn at their visa interview at the U.S. consulate, that they are barred for ten years because of their previous unlawful presence in the U.S.

With hope that there will be immigration reform within the next two years that will provide “a pathway to citizenship,” many immigration lawyers are reporting that many immigrants are choosing to remain in the U.S., albeit illegally, rather than return to their home country and risk being barred for 10 years.

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