(film reel clattering) - Hello, and welcome to our national Ethnic Media Services' Zoom conference.

And, thank you so much for joining us.

I'm Sandy Close, EMS Director.

Today, we focus on what, along with healthcare, has been systematically the most important topic we've covered over the last three years of these briefings: immigration.

And, particularly, what significant policy changes we might expect in the year 2023.

We will look specifically at the expansion of Title 42 as announced by the White House on January 5th, the future of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals Program or DACA, and business immigration, among other issues.

Our speakers include Kerri Talbot, deputy director for the Immigration Hub.

Edward Kissam, co-trustee at the Werner-Kohnstamm Foundation which actively defends immigrant rights.

Cyrus Mehta, founder of Cyrus D. Mehta and Partners, PLLC, which focuses on immigration law.

And, Ariel G. Ruiz Soto, policy analyst at the Migration Policy Institute.

We're grateful to all of you.

All of you, we've sought your advice, counsel, direction, expertise in previous briefings.

And this year, as we start 2023, having your voices, your perspectives, your expertise, is of great value to us.

With that, I wanna turn the conference over to my colleague, Sunita Sohrabji, EMS Health Editor and co-coordinator with Pilar Marrero of our weekly Zoom briefings.

Thank you, Sunita.

- [Sunita] Thank you, Sandy.

Let's start the briefing off today with Kerri Talbot, who will provide us with an overview of what to expect this year in immigration policy.

Ms. Talbot, welcome to the briefing.

- Great!

Thank you so much for having me.

So, I'll talk a little bit first about Congress.

And then, I will also talk about actions the administration can and should take on immigration.

Given the fact that Congress is unlikely to be able to pass legislation, we at the Immigration Hub will be focused on working with the administration to do as much in the way of positive policy changes as possible for immigrants.

Some of the issues that we'll bring up with the administration and continue to push for are expansion of Temporary Protected Status for individuals from countries that require it.

For example, the administration just gave TPS for Somalia, and we do hope and anticipate that they will do that for other countries, as well.

So, that TPS is definitely an area where the administration's done a really good job extending protections to people who are not able to return to their home countries.

In addition, we'll be talking to administration about what they can do to protect DACA recipients.

As everyone knows here, the DREAM-- DACA's situation is up before the Supreme Court.

Soon-- it's still in the lower courts, but it will eventually make its way to the Supreme Court, probably receiving a decision by 2025.

So, we are worried that DACA will or could likely eventually end, and we would like the administration to protect DACA recipients through new administrative policies that allow more people to adjust their status and become Green Card holders.

And, finally, we'll work with the agencies to try to improve processes and make sure human rights are protected.

Try to make sure we close detention centers that aren't meeting basic standards, try to provide more legal counsel to people in proceedings.

And, try to improve USCIS processes as well, reducing backlogs, and also looking for ways either through Congress or through the administration to enhance access to Green Cards.

So, I think I'll end there.

Thank you so much for having me.

- [Sunita] Kerri, thank you so much.

I have a question for you.

And then, we'll go to questions in the chat.

Courts have determined much of immigration policy over the past four years.

Do you expect this to continue, and to what extent will this prevail...over this year?

- Yeah.

Definitely, the courts have played a really active role on immigration policy.

You know, there are several key cases that will come before the courts, including on Title 42, which we'll probably hear more about in a few minutes.

And, it is-- it will be certainly very important to see what the Supreme Court says in that case as well as other cases.

However, I do think there's areas for the administration to move forward where, hopefully, we could be able to enact some changes that aren't blocked by the courts.

I think changes including how the agencies function, like how USCIS functions, how they apply existing waivers, et cetera, are areas where we could hopefully avoid the courts' enjoining administrative actions.

But, yeah.

You're definitely right.

It's certainly every administrative action that the administration considers is always gonna be looked at through the lens of what the courts will end up doing with regards to these new policies.

- [Sunita] Thank you, Kerri.

We are going to move on to Edward Kissam, who will be discussing Title 42.

Welcome, Edward.

- Greetings!

It's good to be joining you today.

And, despite the terrible conditions faced by asylum seekers at the border, I wanted- instead, of focusing on that which has had a good deal of coverage- I wanted to focus on the policy aspects of the whole Title 42 wrangling.

And, I'd like to start with calling your attention to the conceptually corrupt and scientifically inaccurate genesis of Title 42 when it was first put in place by the Trump administration.

There's an excellent report from the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis which includes some really relevant information.

And, specifically, the key information comes from Dr. Martin Cetron, who was director of CDC's Division of Global Migration and Quarantine.

Dr. Cetron's testimony was that (reads) "the proposed order "was not drafted by me or by my team, "but was instead handed to us.

"In fact, it was handed to CDC "by Stephen Miller, well-known, anti-immigrant figure for many years."

Dr. Cetron went on in his testimony to the subcommittee to say that the facts about coronavirus at the border didn't jibe with the data and realities on the ground.

Particularly, since there were already hotspots in the U.S. that were much more powerfully overwhelming.

So, the genesis was totally irresponsible.

Subsequently, the anti-immigrant states' suit to continue implementation of Title 42 at the point that the Biden administration sought to terminate it is-- was totally irresponsible in that, if you look at their arguments, they have entirely to do with complaints about the costs that states would incur in serving immigrants, and in dealing with influx of immigrants.

There's virtually nothing about public health in any of the plaintiff's complaints in those-- in that litigation.

They're simply generic arguments against immigrants.

This is tragic because the actual-- the furor over Title 42 has distracted from the actual public health strategy to combat the COVID pandemic.

And, I-- it's, um?

Public health experts agree that the key element in defending the country against the pandemic is increasing vaccination rates, a strategy which the same anti-immigrant actors are seeking to undermine with anti-vaxxer statements.

The Supreme Court's decision consideration of the-- of the case is very interesting, particularly, because of Justice Gorsuch's very astute observation.

Justice Gorsuch observes that the effort to use Title 42 to deal with the border crisis is trying to use one tool for a public health crisis to solve another crisis, which is immigration at the border.

And, he went on to say that (reads) "it's hardly obvious that we should rush in "to review a ruling on a motion "to intervene in a case concerning emergency decrees that have outlived their shelf life."

So, with that history, where are we with the new plans from the Biden administration as detailed by Secretary Mayorkas and by DHS?

Actually, the availability of CBP One as a mobile app for facilitating scheduling of asylum seekers' appointments at the border is really a good one.

However, whether it is useful or not, in fact, depends on how many interviews get scheduled and how those interviews are conducted and whether they include serious consideration of the asylum seekers' requests.

Another challenge is whether anything that the administration proposes at the border, which includes a request for $3.4 billion to implement its proposed "six pillars" of the new strategy will pass Congress.

There's a horrifying manifesto put forward by Chip Roy called "A Commitment to Secure the Border: a Framework by Texans for Texas", which sets out his views along with 28 other House Republicans from Texas about what should be done.

And, one of the things, for example, that Biden has proposed to do, which is to provide adequate resources to migrant-serving organizations is definitely on the hit list for the conservative Republicans.

I won't go on too long about the flaws in the Biden plan, but in terms of provisions for the parole program.

But, obviously, not so many of the asylum seekers who are supposed to benefit from that parole program are in a position to have U.S. sponsors to actually secure financial support for them here.

$30,000 per month which may appear to be a generous offer is not really so much.

The second obvious issue is they're not in a position necessarily to put those requests together.

And, one of the parts of the plan is already dead-on-arrival because the Stephen Miller inspired notion of requiring asylum seekers from South America and Central America to seek asylum in Mexico has already been rejected by Mexico's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, as quoted in a recent New York Times article.

So, what I would say is that the limited promise of the Biden new plan is uncertain, but given this position that Republicans in Congress are taking, I don't have high hopes that it will be very effective.

- [Sunita] Ed, thank you so much for your comments.

Very welcomed.

We move on to Ariel Ruiz Soto... [struggles] Excuse me!

Sorry, Ariel; from MPI.

Ariel will be speaking about DACA.

Welcome, Ariel.

- Thank you, Sunita.

And, thank you everybody for the opportunity to be here with you.

I'd like to, again, focus on DACA.

I know that Kerri mentioned some of the longer strategies and barriers on DACA.

And so, I'm happy to come back to, and add in those questions you may have.

So, let's start by just sort of explaining what DACA is.

The Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, DACA, known as DACA, is a program that is locked in place and is really protecting only a shrinking population since September 2017, following the decision of the Trump administration to end the program.

Since September 2017, the program has really been snared in litigation across district courts competing in Washington, in Texas, and other places, trying to figure out what can be the future of the legality of how DACA was implemented by the Obama administration back in 2012.

Currently, only those immigrants who have DACA prior to a termination date-- who "had" DACA prior to a termination date, may apply to renew their status.

After a long series of appeals, the Fifth Court-- the First Circuit Court asked District Judge Hanen in Texas to evaluate the merits of a new Biden administration issuance of DACA guidelines, which he did early on in his administration to try to figure out what of these new guidelines could actually remain to be different and more strong in place than the previous Obama definition, or Obama implementation of that.

This was done in October of 2022.

A ruling by Judge Hanen could be delivered within weeks or months.

It really depends on the oral arguments, but we know from statements about.

- [Sunita] Ariel?

I'm so sorry to interrupt, but the interpreters are asking you to please slow down.

Could you please do that?

Thank you!

- Yep!

As I was saying, a ruling by Judge Hanen from Texas could be delivered within weeks or months, depending on the oral arguments that are scheduled by Judge Hanen.

He has suggested in previous texts that he's delivered to the plaintiffs that he would like to move quickly on this issue and resolve the case significantly earlier or early this year.

As Kerri mentioned, there are some scenarios here that I'll come back to here in a moment.

But first, let me sort of explain about the DACA criteria.

For someone to have been eligible to receive DACA, they have had to enter the country before 2012, have been present since then.

Have been under the age of 16 when they came to the United States, have been under the age of 31 as of June 15, 2012 and they had to have been enrolled in school, have a high school diploma or equivalent or have been honorably discharged from the Armed Forces.

And, another component is not have any criminal or felony, significant misdemeanors on their background.

Those that have had DACA since 2012, research suggests that they have been provided a multitude of benefits.

These benefits include new and formal employment opportunities, accessing loans and banking options that they would not otherwise be able to, and specifically in some states, being able to purchase homes or cars- essentially loans- and generally being able to contribute financially to their families and communities.

In some states, DACA also provided access to driver's licenses, in-state tuition, professional certifications.

And also, beneficiaries who have DACA can apply for a advanced parole which is a process that allows migrants to leave the country and to return, to enter back to all ports of entry legally.

The current number of DACA holders is 590,000.

This is as of September 2022, and it shows that it's fallen since its height in May of 2018, which was a little bit over 700,000.

So again, from 700,000 today, the program stands at 590,000.

The reduction is due to several reasons, including some DACA holders adjusting status to another status, either by marrying a U.S. citizen or by receiving a visa or by other potential statuses.

And, likely, some have included-- some of them DACA holders may have fallen out of status, may have committed a crime or may have not reapplied in time.

Some may have left the country.

And, perhaps, some of them as well, may have passed away.

MPI estimates today that 1.2 million immigrants would qualify for DACA as it stands.

And so, the difference between the 508,000 to the 1.2 million here shows that there's some differences, even before the program was ended.

The program has had significantly high rates of application among Mexican immigrants and significantly low rates among Asian immigrants, but in particularly, South Korean immigrants.

In terms of demographics, the vast majority of Mexicans today- uh, the vast majority of DACA recipients today are Mexicans with 81% of the population.

Smaller shares of immigrants with DACA are from El Salvador, 4%; Guatemala, 3%; and Honduras at 2%.

Of all the DACA holders, 54% identify as female and their average age is 20 years old.

29% of all DACA recipients live in California alone: 29%; 16% live in Texas, and 5% live in Illinois.

These three states combined represent half of all DACA holders in the country.

Their top metropolitan areas of residence are, in order, Los Angeles, New York City, Dallas, Houston, and Chicago.

With all this in mind, it is possible that Judge Hanen will rule against DACA as many of service have suggested.

And, in that case, absent any Congressional action, the program could sunset over the next two years.

When that decision has happened, as Kerri mentioned, the Supreme Court may likely take this case forward.

And, certainly, if that happens, if Judge Hanen rules against DACA, likely the Biden administration will appeal.

If at least, in the interim process, the Biden administration could also change discretionary enforcement policies and agendas to reduce the prioritization of DACA holders or former DACA holders in that case, in terms of reducing their likelihood of being deported.

But, perhaps, what's most important in this scenario would be that these migrants, or immigrants, would lose status from one day to the next.

Slowly, gradually, those benefits and economic, but also social, benefits that they've achieved will be going away.

And many, possibly- some of them- may consider going back to their country of origin, specifically here in Mexico.

So, again, it is likely that Judge Hanen will rule in the next few weeks or month.

And when he does, we- MPI, and others- likely will have more analysis on what could potentially be future scenarios.

So, I will leave it there, Sandy, for-- to take questions.

- [Sunita] What are the immigration projections for 2023?

Given that we seem to be in a stalemate with the courts and our divided Congress.

And, I'll ask this question of each of you.

Let's start out with Ariel.

- Sure.

In terms of projections, I think Kerri said it best at the beginning.

It is not likely that Congress will move significantly on any significant structural legislation change, given the House-controlled-- the Republican control of the House and the Democratic control of the Senate.

That said, there may be smaller options at the executive level, either at the agency discretionary policies that could have some effect in the lives of more immigrants.

When it comes to DACA, as I said during my remarks, it is not likely, but there is a small possibility that Democrats and Republicans could have some compromise if a judge had in ruling is a negative one.

Meaning, that the pressure would be significant for Congress to do something for the over 590,000 people who would be able to-- who currently have DACA, would begin to lose their status over the course of two years.

So-?

- [Sunita] Thank you.

- That would be my suggestion.

- [Sunita] Thank you, Ariel.

Ms. Talbot, do you see an optimistic future for 2023?

- I see-- I'm optimistic about different administrative changes that could be made.

I'm definitely not optimistic about Congress, but I definitely think the Biden administration can do some really important things in terms of allowing DACA folks and others to be able to use new ways to get nonimmigrant visas.

And, allowing new ways to adjust status and other long-term residents as well through grants of TPS and through some other policies we're proposing.

So, I'm hopeful that the administration will keep trying to help as many people as possible.

- [Sunita] Yes, of course.

And, Mr. Kissam, you have the last word.

- Whether Congress can work its way through the current situation of irrational conflicts is beyond my ability to project, but I am hopeful and think that efforts need to be pursued with business playing a really major role.

[background music] - [Sunita] Thank you so much to all of our speakers who attended today.

Sandy, any final words?

- No.

No, just that wrap-up.

I mean this was, like, very, very helpful.

Everything that people said just punctuated all of the individual presentations.

And, I think the notion that one group of immigrants' fortune [background music] really links and ties in with everyone else.

So, what Kerri said at the beginning, the groups you're focusing on, any change in one of those groups' fortunes ripples out and affects everybody else.

So, thank you for clarifying.

Thank you for illuminating.

Thank you for giving us your time.

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