By Corinne Murdock |
The Biden administration announced on Monday that it would begin to factor “statelessness” in illegal immigration cases, effectively opening up another pathway to citizenship. The use of statelessness as a legal tool traces back to efforts by the United Nations (UN) to globally unify and effectively legalize all migration.
“We are updating filing instructions for all deferred action requests, including those from noncitizens who believe they are stateless, and for parole-in-place applications,” stated the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS).
The taxpayer-funded UN has made it apparent through both their words and actions that they intend to nullify any distinction between illegal and legal immigration, or “global migration governance.” The UN holds that the denial of certain citizenship rights to noncitizens constitutes wrongful discrimination.
For example, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) advocates for noncitizens to enjoy citizenship rights and benefits such as voting, employment, public education, banking access, housing purchases, and marriage. The UN Conventions on Statelessness aims to establish rights to education, employment, and housing for noncitizens.
Last year, UNHCR was discovered to be facilitating illegal immigration by handing out funds, such as cash debit cards, to illegal immigrants headed to the U.S. The UN dubbed its aiding and abetting system of waystations throughout Mexico the “cash-based interventions,” or CBI.
At the tail end of its press release, USCIS included two links from the UN outlining its goal of ending statelessness.
The USCIS policy guidance was issued on Aug. 1, with Monday serving as the date the policy went into effect. According to the policy, claims of statelessness may be used as a means for justifying illegal immigration.
USCIS included an open-ended list of valid reasons for establishing statelessness. It defined statelessness as having no nationality with any country; the cited federal law defined “national” as meaning a person owing permanent allegiance to a state.
The agency also echoed the UN’s global migration governance advocacy, noting that illegal immigrants — characterized as “stateless individuals” — can’t vote and may not be able to obtain education, employment, health care, property, or registration of life events like births, marriages, and deaths.
Listed examples of justification for establishing statelessness included: a lack of birth registration and birth certificates; birth to illegal immigrant parents; the political change and transfer of territory that may (or may not) alter the nationality status of citizens of the former state or states; administrative oversights, procedural problems, conflict of law between two countries, or destruction of official records; alteration of nationality during marriage or the dissolution of marriage between couples from different countries; targeted discrimination against minorities; laws restricting acquisition of citizenship; laws restricting the rights of women to pass on their nationality to their children; laws relating to children born out of wedlock or during transit; or loss, revocation, or relinquishment of nationality without first acquiring another.
In its Monday press release, USCIS offered instructions for those illegal immigrants considered “stateless” to obtain various types of permissions to remain in the country: deferred action, employment authorization after a grant of deferred action, parole in place, asylum, U or T nonimmigrant status, temporary protected status, or employment authorization with TPS.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) first announced the factoring in of “statelessness” for illegal immigrants back in December 2021. As part of this novel approach, DHS committed to coordinating with the Department of State to mitigate the barriers to relief and benefits resulting from statelessness. It also committed to establishing a process to improve data collection efforts as well as securing work and travel opportunities for stateless illegal immigrants.
Corinne Murdock is a reporter for AZ Free News. Follow her latest on Twitter, or email tips to corinne@azfreenews.com.
