WASHINGTON, CMC—The Fair Immigration Reform Movement (FIRM) has welcomed President Joe Biden’s plan to strengthen protections for undocumented Caribbean and other spouses of US citizens and Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) beneficiaries.
However, the immigrant rights group, a national network of 40 immigrant rights organizations across the United States, warned that more is needed to restore what it described as “trust in Biden’s leadership on immigration across impacted communities.”
Last week, Biden announced new actions that would support the ability of undocumented Caribbean and other immigrants to work and remain in the United States with their families without fear of deportation. At the same time, they pursue a pathway to legal status.
FIRM hailed the announcement as a victory for immigrant rights organizing, even as it cautioned that the policy details are still under development and pressed the Biden administration and the US Congress to “do more to urgently bring tangible improvements to the lives of immigrants and their families.”
In a joint statement, FIRM co-chairs Mireya Reith and Murad Awawdeh said the Biden administration’s announcement was “a rare moment of relief for all of us who have fought to keep families together.
“We welcome Biden’s executive actions to protect DACA recipients and the undocumented spouses of US Citizens,” they said.
“These are reforms that immigrant rights organizations have demanded since Biden took office, and the announcement is a clear victory for organizing, and it signals the growing political influence of immigrant communities in the United States.”
But Reith and Awawdeh added, “Words are welcome, but action must follow.
“The organizers who have driven this change will also work to ensure that its implementation welcomes new Americans and does not leave people behind.
“We urge the Biden administration and the Department of Homeland Security to move swiftly on the final policy, to write the rules to provide as broad a relief as possible, to engage impacted immigrants and their organizations in that process, and to make the necessary investments in community organizations to ensure the success of these policies.”
FIRM, however, described the announcement as “a step in the right direction,” stating that it “will begin to rebuild trust in Biden’s leadership to make good on promises he made to immigrant communities in the last election.
“This is also the right thing to do. These proposed policies are common sense reforms, and they are long overdue. Biden must do more to bring tangible improvements to the lives of immigrant families and directly engage with immigrant communities.
“This move should be a permanent movement in policy, not merely a moment. The Administration must find the courage to follow its step in the right direction – ending its Trump-style asylum ban at the US border and its cruel and costly expansion in surveillance, weapons, and walls targeted at people seeking safety.”
FIRM said that voters will remember what the government did and did not do for their families and communities in November, referring to the November presidential election in the US. “Candidates can’t defeat the politics of division by compromising with it. Instead, they must stand for the confident, coherent, and compassionate approach to migration in a united America.”
Last week, New York City Mayor Eric Adams welcomed Biden’s executive order expanding work authorization for longtime undocumented Caribbean and other immigrants.
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