Immigration activist groups and Democratic doves in the Senate are slamming the new border deal put together by Senate negotiators and released on Sunday.
Immigration activist groups, as well as some top immigration doves in Congress, are condemning the new immigration and border deal in the Senate — narrowing further the already embattled deal’s potential for passage.
Senate negotiators released the $118 billion supplemental spending deal package late Sunday, which includes funding for Ukraine, Israel and $20 billion in funding for border and immigration-related matters.
It includes a new border authority to allow Title 42-style expulsions when migration levels exceed 5,000 a day over a seven-day rolling average, and it narrows asylum eligibility while expediting the process, provides additional work permits to asylum seekers and funds a massive increase in staffing.
It is facing considerable heat from conservatives, including in the Republican-controlled House, where lawmakers have claimed the deal will regularize high levels of illegal immigration, while funding non-governmental organizations and giving legal aid to illegal immigrants.
But it has also upset many on the left, with immigrant activists saying it harms migrants without giving relief — including any form of amnesty for those in the country already, such as illegal immigrants who came to the country as minors and whom activists have named “Dreamers.”
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which has led many lawsuits against immigration policies, including Title 42, said the deal would “force the government to summarily expel people from the border without due process, restricting legal pathways for the people who need them most.”
“Eliminating longstanding, core due process protections like court review of asylum cases and doubling down on harmful deterrence and detention policies are not going to get cities and states the support they need, nor are they a substitute for policies that would improve border management and address the immigration case backlog,” executive director Anthony Romero said.
