FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
December 20, 2022
Contact:
Michelle Boykins, Advancing Justice – AAJC, Mboykins@advancingjustice-aajc.org
Niketa Kumar, Advancing Justice – Asian Law Caucus, media@advancingjustice-alc.org
Liza Ameen, AJSOCAL, lameen@ajsocal.org
James Woo, Advancing Justice – Atlanta, jwoo@advancingjustice-atlanta.org
Asian Americans Advancing Justice Condemn the Removal of Family-Sponsored Immigration Reform in Budget Deal
Anti-Immigrant Lawmakers Once Again Block Crucial, Common-Sense Reforms and Legislation
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Today, a budget deal was published that failed to include crucial, immigration-related provisions. Despite the inclusion of straightforward reforms to the family-based immigration system in both the House FY2023 Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Appropriations Bill and the Chairman’s Mark of the Senate FY2023 DHS Appropriations Bill, appropriators stripped out these provisions and denied the inclusion of other important proposals such as the Adoptee Citizenship Act, Afghan Adjustment Act, the farmworkers bill, and a pathway to citizenship for undocumented youth.
Asian Americans Advancing Justice, an affiliation of five independent civil rights organizations, releases the following statement:
“Family unity is not a partisan issue. Families are the fundamental building block of this country, and the refusal to help reunite families stuck in the immigration backlog is a rejection of our best values of inclusion and community care. The objections of Republican lawmakers once again leave millions of immigrants separated from their families for another holiday season.
“The provisions included in both the House and Senate FY2023 DHS Appropriations bill would have recaptured hundreds of thousands of unused visas, prevented visas from being wasted in the future, and provided green cards to people who were awarded diversity visas but who could not receive them due to the Trump administration’s immigration bans. Yet, instead of allowing these common-sense policy proposals to help the children, spouses, and siblings of Asian Americans and other families, Senate Republicans decided to demand that these provisions—and other provisions that would have helped immigrant families and communities—be stripped from the final budget deal.
“Four million people are waiting to be reunited with their families here in the U.S. Some of those individuals will wait for over 20 years before a green card becomes available. We demand that Congress take urgent action to reform our family-based immigration system and reunite families.”
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Asian Americans Advancing Justice is a national affiliation of five leading organizations advocating for the civil and human rights of Asian Americans and other underserved communities to promote a fair and equitable society for all. The affiliation’s members are: Advancing Justice | AAJC (Washington, DC), Advancing Justice – Asian Law Caucus (San Francisco), Advancing Justice – Southern California (AJSOCAL), Advancing Justice – Atlanta, and Advancing Justice – Chicago.