The Trump Administration Just Created Hundreds of Thousands of Illegal Immigrants
A blow to recent arrivals from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has terminated the parole status of hundreds of thousands of migrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela. These people, who have been living and working in the country, must now self-deport or face immigration enforcement actions.
An estimated 530,000 people came to the country through the CHNV parole program. (The initials stand for "Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, Venezuela.") This pathway, implemented by President Joe Biden in January 2023, granted foreign nationals from those four countries U.S. work permits and deportation protection for two years while they sought other means of legal status. To qualify for CHNV parole, migrants had to have a sponsor based in the U.S. and pass security vetting.
Republicans denounced the program as a misuse of parole authority, and in October 2024 the Biden administration decided against extending it. It's unclear how many people obtained alternative means of legal status to stay in the country after arriving under the program.
On his first day in office, President Donald Trump signed an executive order directing DHS to "terminate all categorical parole programs that are contrary to the policies of the United States established in my Executive Orders." Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem terminated the CHNV parole program on March 25, but legal challenges quickly blocked her move. In April, Judge Indira Talwani of the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts ruled that migrants on CHNV parole were entitled to a case-by-case review and implemented a preliminary injunction to pause Noem's order. That injunction was itself then paused by the Supreme Court, allowing deportation actions against people on CHNV parole to proceed while legal challenges continue to move forward.
Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson authored a dissent, joined by Justice Sonia Sotomayor, decrying the "devastating consequences of allowing the Government to precipitously upend the lives and livelihoods of nearly half a million noncitizens while their legal claims are pending."
On Thursday, June 12, DHS—once again—began terminating the parole status of migrants benefiting from the parole program. Tricia McLaughlin, assistant secretary for public affairs at Homeland Security, declared in a press release that DHS was aiming to reverse the "disastrous" effects of allowing "poorly vetted illegal aliens into the United States" to "compete for American jobs and undercut American workers."
Revoking a noncitizen's parole status may well be within Noem's legal authority, but the termination of this program will impact hundreds of thousands of migrants who came to the United States legally to make a better life for themselves. Many migrated due to urgent humanitarian reasons, seeking refuge from violence, from oppressive authoritarian socialist regimes, and from severe economic crises. And the program did—as intended—relieve pressure and disorder on the southern border.
