President Obama’s Biggest Immigration Reforms Set to Benefit 5 Million Immigrants

In his Presidential Address Thursday President Obama unveiled what is deemed as the biggest immigration reforms since the 1980s, which will benefit close to five million illegal immigrants in the U.S. The reforms will remove their fear of deportation and make them eligible to get work permits.

There are some 11 million illegal immigrants in the United States. With his announcement Thursday, close to five million will benefit from the executive orders, which include immigrants who have stayed continuously for five years and have children that are already U.S. citizens or legally staying in the country.

With Congress increasingly dominated by Republicans, using executive actions have been the President’s way to work around the gridlock in Congress. The Republicans have argued that the President’s decision to take executive action and bypass Congress is almost equivalent to granting these undocumented immigrants amnesty. In his speech the President said that amnesty is what the present immigration system has today, where millions of people were allowed to live in the country without obeying the rules and without paying taxes.

The President’s Immigration Program

What he was saying was that with the immigration reforms he had in mind, those undocumented immigrants that are qualified based on the criteria he had issued would be able to come out in the open, get work permits, have social security and apply for driver’s license but they will have to pay taxes.

Under the program, undocumented parents of children who are already citizens of the United States or hold legal resident status will be granted the chance to apply for work permits, which will be in effect for three years. These parents should have lived in the U.S. for five consecutive years and should pass a criminal background check.

Part of the program will give temporary legal status to those who were brought to the U.S. as children. The former immigration program, launched in 2012 affected people who were under 30 years old who arrived in the U.S. before 2007. This covered about 1.2 million. Under the new plan, cut-off year will be extended to 2010 and the age cap was removed. This will affect another 300,000 undocumented immigrants.

Potential number of immigrants affected

According to the Migration Policy Institute about 3.7 million people will be eligible for the new immigration reforms. There are 11.4 million undocumented immigrants in the United States. About 6.2 million of them are not eligible to apply. Some 1.2 million are already covered by the existing immigration reform and the just-released reform changes have the potential to affect another four million. The reforms will give those who qualify the chance to legally work and stay in the U.S. although the path to citizenship is not covered here.

While Congress accused President Obama of power grabbing, he argued that the American people are getting tired of the gridlock. He also said that he wants to work with Republicans and Democrats so they can reach a permanent solution for a better immigration system.

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