Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.) released a new immigration plan Monday, wading into a contentious debate as President Trump pushes to crack down at the border.
The plan from Gallego follows a similar pattern of other past proposals, promoting a pathway to citizenship for Dreamers and others in the U.S. while pushing for expanded personnel and enforcement at the border.
“We don’t have to choose between border security and immigration reform. We can and should do both. Americans deserve the right to feel safe knowing their border is secure, but for decades, Congress has tried and failed to take action because politics got in the way. It’s time to push forward and enact a plan that works,” Gallego said in a statement.
Under Gallego’s plan, Congress would fund increased hiring for Border Patrol agents as well as hiring other staff to handle processing and transportation of migrants. It doesn’t fully endorse Trump’s border wall but does call for some barriers. It would also establish a migration reserve corps to help deal with “unexpected migrant surges” that would require more personnel.
It would also place new limitations on asylum — a protection sought by many migrants who claim they are fleeing persecution or danger. Gallego’s plan would raise the standard to obtain asylum protections — which is something also sought by Republicans, who argue the protections should be harder to gain.
He also calls for gradually phasing in use of E-Verify across the country, forcing business to ascertain whether employees are legally allowed to work in the U.S.
His proposal seeks to address a yearslong backlog of such cases by augmenting the number of asylum officers and giving them the power to adjudicate claims — removing the matter from immigration court.
To ease constraints on immigration, his plan would also provide a pathway to citizenship for Dreamers, those brought to the U.S. as children, as well as spouses of citizens who do not yet have legal status.
It would boost a number of caps on visas and green cards, with Gallego referencing “arbitrary” caps that limit the number of immigrants from certain countries. He also calls for increasing U.S. refugee processing — a program Trump has currently suspended.
Finally, his plan nods to similar efforts by the Biden administration in igniting a “root causes” strategy that seeks to address factors prompting migration. Gallego calls for a Western Hemisphere engagement strategy, including creating more asylum capacity across Latin America and pushing for more “responsibility sharing” for taking on migrants and refugees.
The Senate last year abandoned another immigration proposal that similarly would have paired increased funds at the border with streamlining some immigration pathways.
The effort was almost immediately spiked by then-candidate Trump, undercutting GOP interest in the bill.
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