President Joe Biden on Tuesday unveiled a massive immigration relief policy to non-citizens offering a path to citizenship to non-citizen spouses and children of American nationals, a move that will protect approximately half a million spouses of US citizens, several thousands of whom are Indian-Americans.

“This action will protect approximately half a million spouses of US citizens, and approximately 50,000 non-citizen children under the age of 21 whose parents are married to a US citizen,” the White House said.

Biden, who is seeking re-election in the November 5 presidential election, has directed the Department of Homeland Security to take action to ensure that US citizens with non-citizen spouses and children can keep their families together.

Also read: Bipartisan National Security Agreement provides 100K work authorisation to spouses and children of H-1B visa holders

This new process will help certain non-citizen spouses and children apply for lawful permanent residence – status that they are already eligible for – without leaving the country, the White House said.

These actions will promote family unity and strengthen our economy, providing a significant benefit to the country and helping US citizens and their noncitizen family members stay together, it added.

The action is aimed at appealing to key Latino constituencies in battleground states, including Arizona, Nevada and Georgia, that will be crucial for Biden’s chances to claim a second term, CNN reported.

The move is an olive branch to immigration advocates and progressives, many of whom have sharply criticised Biden for previous restrictive actions, including taking steps this month to limit asylum processing at the US southern border, it said.

Biden has also directed to allow individuals including DACA recipients and other Dreamers, who have earned a degree at an accredited US institution of higher education in the United States, and who have received an offer of employment from a US employer in a field related to their degree, to more quickly receive work visas.

“Recognising that it is in our national interest to ensure that individuals who are educated in the US are able to use their skills and education to benefit our country, the Administration is taking action to facilitate the employment visa process for those who have graduated from college and have a high-skilled job offer, including DACA recipients and other Dreamers,” the White House said.

“Dreamer” originally referred to the Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors (DREAM) Act, a piece of legislation that would have given immigrant youth legal status and a path to US citizenship.

According to the White House, to be eligible, non-citizens must – as of June 17, 2024 – have resided in the United States for 10 or more years and be legally married to a US citizen, while satisfying all applicable legal requirements. On average, those who are eligible for this process have resided in the US for 23 years.

Those who are approved after DHS’s case-by-case assessment of their application will be afforded a three-year period to apply for permanent residency. They will be allowed to remain with their families in the US and be eligible for work authorisation for up to three years. This will apply to all married couples who are eligible.

Also read: Nearly 66K Indians took oath of American citizenship in 2022: CRS report

According to the White House, this programme will protect approximately half a million spouses of US citizens, and approximately 50,000 non-citizen children under the age of 21 whose parents are married to a US citizen.

More than 1.1 million undocumented spouses married to a US citizen, thousands of whom are Indian-Americans, have lived in the US on average 16 years, and many have been married to their US citizen spouses for at least a decade. The announcement is expected to impact approximately 500,000 undocumented spouses of US citizens and 50,000 undocumented children of US citizens nationwide.

Opposing the move, the rival Trump campaign said that Biden’s mass amnesty plan will undoubtedly lead to a greater surge in migrant crime, cost taxpayers millions of dollars they cannot afford, overwhelm public services, and steal Social Security and Medicare benefits from American seniors to fund benefits for illegals — draining the programs Americans paid into their entire working lives.

“Biden has created another invitation for illegal immigration through his mass amnesty order,” said Trump campaign National Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt.

US Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin, Chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, applauded Biden’s announcement to offer relief to hundreds of thousands of immigrants, including DACA holders and undocumented spouses and children of US citizens.

“Allowing those who have lived here at least ten years a chance to continue living here without fear of deportation is fair and long overdue. The Republican Party and its chosen leader see immigration in terms of fear and hate and ‘poisoning the blood’ of America. President Biden understands that, as challenging as it may be, immigration is at the heart of who we are as Americans. I commend President Biden for today’s announcement. It’s the right thing,” said Durbin.

Panama is on the verge of a dramatic change to its immigration policy that could reverberate from the dense Darien jungle to the U.S. border.

President-elect José Raúl Mulino says he will shut down a migration route used by more than 500,000 people last year. Until now, Panama has helped speedily bus the migrants across its territory so they can continue their journey North.

Whether Mr. Mulino is able to reduce migration through a sparsely populated region with little Government presence remains to be seen, experts say.

“Panama and our Darien are not a transit route. It is our border,” Mr. Mulino said after his victory with 34% of the vote in Sunday’s election was formalised on May 9 evening.

As he had suggested during his campaign, the 64-year-old Lawyer and former security Minister said he would try to end “the Darien odyssey that does not have a reason to exist”.

The migrant route through the narrow isthmus grew exponentially in popularity in recent years with the help of organised crime in Colombia, making it an affordable, if dangerous, land route for hundreds of thousands.

It grew as countries like Mexico, under pressure from the U.S. Government, imposed visa restrictions on various nationalities including Venezuelans and just this week Peruvians in an attempt to stop migrants flying into the country just to continue on to the U.S. border.

But masses of people took the challenge and set out on foot through the jungle-clad Colombian-Panamanian border. A crossing that initially could take a week or more eventually was whittled down to two or three days as the path became more established and entrepreneurial locals established a range of support services.

It remains a risky route, however. Reports of sexual assaults have continued to rise, some migrants are killed by bandits in robberies and others drown trying to cross rushing rivers.

Migrants dead, missing after boat capsizes off Panama coast

Even so, some 147,000 migrants have already entered Panama through Darien this year.

Previous attempts to close routes around the world have simply shifted traffic to riskier paths.

“People migrate for many reasons and frequently don’t have safe, orderly and legal ways to do it,” said Giuseppe Loprete, chief of mission in Panama for the UN’s International Organisation for Immigration.

“When the legal routes are not accessible, migrants run the risk of turning to criminal networks, traffickers and dangerous routes, tricked by disinformation.” Loprete said the UN agency’s representatives in Panama would meet with Mr. Mulino’s team once its member are named to learn the specifics of the president’s plans.

If Mr. Mulino could be even partially effective, it could produce a notable, but likely temporary, impact. As with the visa restrictions that unintentionally steered migrants to the overland route through Panama, if the factors pushing migrants to leave their countries remain they will find other routes. One could be the dangerous sea routes from Colombia to Panama.

In a local radio interview on May 9, Mr. Mulino said the idea of shutting down the migration flow is more philosophical than a physical obstacle.

“Because when we start to deport people here in an immediate deportation plan the interest for sneaking through Panama will decrease,” he said. By the time the fourth plane loaded with migrants takes off, “I assure you they are going to say that going through Panama is not attractive because they are deporting you.” Julio Alonso, a Panamanian security expert, said what Mr. Mulino could realistically achieve is unknown.

“This would be a radical change to Panamanian policy in terms of migration to avoid more deaths and organised crime using the route,” he said.

Among the challenges will be how it would work operationally along such an open and uncontrolled border.

“In Panama, there is no kind of suppression with this situation, just free passage, humanitarian aid that didn’t manage to reduce the number of assaults, rapes, homicides and deaths along the Darien route,” Mr. Alonso said.

Mr. Mulino’s proposal is “a dissuasive measure, yes, (but) whether it can be completely executed we will see”.

It’s also unlikely that much could be accomplished without a lot of cooperation and coordination with Colombia and other countries, he said.

Adam Isacson, an analyst at the Washington Office on Latin America, said that “without considering the risk of returning migrants to dangerous situations, in mathematical terms I don’t know how they hope to massively deport” migrants.

“A daily plane, which would be extremely expensive, would only repatriate around 10 per cent of the flow (about 1,000 to 1,200 per day). The United States only manages to do about 130 flights monthly in the entire world,” Mr. Isacson said.

Darwin Cigarroa, a migrant from Venezuela, carries a cross while walking toward the U.S. border in a caravan called “The Migrant’s Via Crucis”, in Huixtla, Mexico March 27, 2024.
| Photo Credit: REUTERS

Venezuelan migrants often have a quick answer when asked to name the most difficult stretch of their eight-country journey to the U.S. border, and it’s not the days-long jungle trek through Colombia and Panama with its venomous vipers, giant spiders and scorpions. It’s Mexico.

“In the jungle, you have to prepare for animals. In Mexico, you have to prepare for humans,” Daniel Ventura, 37, said after three days walking through the Darien Gap and four months waiting in Mexico to enter the U.S. legally using the government’s online appointment system, called CBP One.

Mexico’s crackdown on immigration in recent months — at the urging of the Biden administration — has hit Venezuelans especially hard. The development highlights how much the U.S. depends on Mexico to control migration.

Arrests of migrants for illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border have dropped so this year after a record high in December. The biggest decline was among Venezuelans, whose arrests plummeted to 3,184 in February and 4,422 in January from 49,717 in December.

While two months do not make a trend and illegal crossings remain high by historical standards, Mexico’s strategy to keep migrants closer to its border with Guatemala than the U.S. is at least temporary relief for the Biden administration.

Large numbers of Venezuelans began reaching the U.S. in 2021, first by flying to Mexico and then on foot and by bus after Mexico imposed visa restrictions. In September, Venezuelans briefly replaced Mexicans as the largest nationality crossing the border.

Mexico’s efforts have included forcing migrants from trains, flying, and busing them to the southern part of the country.

Last week, Mexico said it would give about $110 a month for six months to each Venezuelan it deports, hoping they won’t come back.

Venezuelans account for the vast majority of 73,166 migrants who crossed the Darien Gap in January and February.

We are looking at two separate aspects of the MEA’s role – one on mediation, the other on how to protect emigrants. But first, the latest in the Israel war on Gaza that is entering its sixth month shortly. The condition of about 2 million people in Gaza, crowded into the Southern part of the strip gets more direct by the day- with homes bombed, no access to food or clean water, and no way out. This week, 112 people were killed as crowds awaiting aid thronged trucks and Israeli soldiers manning the convoy opened fire on them.

1. The clock is ticking on an Israel-Hamas ceasefire plan, which US President Biden had said would be done by Monday, but now many believe will come in by the beginning of Ramzan on March 9 or 10^th. 

2. More than 30,000 have already been killed, 70,000 injured- mostly women and children, in Israeli bombardment and ground operations in retaliation for the October 7 terror attacks in Israel that left about 1140 dead.

3. The ceasefire would pave the way for more hostage releases by Hamas- about 100 or so still remain in the group’s custody

So far mediation efforts have been run by the US and Qatar- on behalf of Israel and Hamas. Egypt and Jordan have also been involved in the effort.

Meanwhile to the other big conflict- Russia’s war in Ukraine, also mediation attempts have stepped up:

At the request of Ukraine, Switzerland’s government is working on a peace conference later this month where they hope to bring both Russia and Ukraine to the table

-Swiss officials are requesting India to attend, with the hope that India could play a part in bringing Russia to the conference, or even work on a ceasefire

-And like with Israel, India has spoken to both Russian and Ukrainian leaders, but not offered any criticism

-India has also send humanitarian aid to Ukraine, yet not sent any infrastructural aid that it requested
So far, New Delhi has said it sees no role in mediation, although it has conveyed messages to Moscow- for the Grain deal initiative and on nuclear safety concerns in Ukraine’s Zaporizhia.

India’s history in Mediation is limited:

-In the 1950s Korean crisis, India actively mediated to control the conflict, led the UN commission on Korea, held elections and worked on the repatriation of prisoners between the two Koreas

-Around the same time, India also took a role in the Vietnam war, and tried to negotiate a ceasefire

However, since then, India has had little interest in mediation for a number of reasons:

1. India’s founding role in the Non Aligned Movement has prompted it to stay away from taking positions on many conflicts

2. Limited leverage- India is not a permanent member of the UNSC, nor is its share of global economy and trade, less than 3% enough to take a decisive position

3. India has consistently opposed mediation in conflicts like Jammu Kashmir- mediating would open it to questions about that policy

4. In other conflicts, like Sri Lanka, India opposed the Norwegian role in favour of the LTTE

5. India’s zero tolerance policy on terrorism also makes mediating or talking to armed groups more difficult.

6. India’s diaspora is in every part of the world- and hence the government’s first priority is negotiating to bring Indians out of harm’s way, not to resolve the conflict itself

A word on the MEA’s policy for emigrants in conflict zones:

1. India discourages the travel of Indians to conflict areas, and the MEA repeated that in a statement this week.

This was in response to a number of articles in The Hindu, authored by my colleague Vijaita Singh

2. The MEA controls and vets the emigration of workers to 18 countries including some conflict zones- Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, Sudan and South Sudan, Syria, and Yemen.

3. As the number of Indian expatriates has increased- Indians are increasingly stuck in conflicts – this week the MEA admitted that about 20 Indians who had travelled to work in Russia had unwittingly been taken to the front for fighting, and India is now negotiating their discharge from the Russian Military

4. In addition, at the request of Israeli PM Netanyahu, the government green-lighted the recruitment of Indian construction workers to replace Palestinians who have been banned from working in Israel after the attacks. The worry now that they too could be taken into conflict areas , including occupied territories or Gaza.

5. Clearly, there is a need for a new policy that updates global conflict zones, and makes it mandatory for those travelling there to have vetted contracts, full information of their deployment and insurance paid by employers. More in The Hindu editorial

WV Take: As global conflicts spread, it is harder for India to remain uninvolved in their resolution- but credibility that comes from being truly neutral in a conflict, can often be the first casualty to any mediation efforts. At the same time, New Delhi has to step up its controls of Indians going into conflict zones, lest they too be seen as partisan in the problem, and are targeted.

WV Reading Recommendations:

On Mediation:

1. The Mediator A Biography of Martti Ahtisaari: by Merikallio and Ruokanen

2. DIPLOMACY by Henry Kissinger (1995)

3. To End a War: The Conflict in Yugoslavia–America’s Inside Story–Negotiating with Milosevic 999 by Richard Holbrooke, as also Our Man by George Packer

4. A Journey: My Political Life by Tony Blair- on the Irish peace process

5. Ulfa: The Mirage of Dawn by Rajeev Bhattacharya