Boiling the Frog Slowly on Immigration

Biden’s unraveling of border rules will be gradual but inexorable.

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A Customs and Border Protection vehicle patrols along a new section of the U.S.-Mexico border wall in El Paso, Texas, August 27, 2020.

Jose Luis Gonzalez/Reuter

President-elect Joe Biden has pledged to reverse the immigration policies implemented by the Trump administration. His campaign site’s immigration page says he will “take urgent action to undo Trump’s damage and reclaim America’s values.” As Rich Lowry has written, “Biden will move on all fronts to loosen immigration controls.”

Despite what anti-borders groups say, this will be relatively easy to do. Because virtually all the changes to immigration policy made by the Trump administration have been executive actions of one sort or another, the incoming administration will simply rescind them in the same manner. That’s what Trump’s people thought they’d be able to do to Obama’s policies, of course, but lawless members of the “Resistance” judiciary have prevented him from discontinuing DACA, or from implementing a new rule on welfare use by prospective legal immigrants, or even from not renewing the ostensibly time-limited Temporary Protected Status work-permit program for certain illegal aliens. Biden will not face that hurdle, and so will be able to undo most everything Trump has done; in some cases immediately, in others over a period of several months.

Mark Krikorian

About the Author

Mark Krikorian

Mark Krikorian is the executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies.

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