Cuellar: Keep Families Together

President Biden has announced that the Department of Homeland Security will take action to ensure that U.S. citizens with noncitizen spouses and children can keep their families together. 

This new process will help certain non citizens spouses and children apply for lawful permanent residence status that they are already eligible for, without leaving the country. 

These actions will promote family unity and strengthen our economy, providing a significant benefit to the country and helping US citizens and their non citizen family members stay together. 

In order to be eligible, noncitizens must – as of June 17 2024 – have resided in the United States for ten or more years and be legally married to a US citizen, while satisfying all applicable legal requirements. On average, those who are eligible for this process have resided in the US for 23 years. 

Those who are approved after DHS’s case-by-case assessment of their application will be afforded a three-year period to apply for permanent residency. They will be allowed to remain with their families in the United States and be eligible for work authorization for up to three years. This will apply to all married couples who are eligible. 

This action will protect approximately half a million spouses of US citizens and approximately 50,000 noncitizen children under the age of 21, whose parent is married to a US citizen.

Easing the visa process for us college graduates including Dreamers 

President Obama and then Vice-President Biden established the DACA policy to allow young people who were brought here as children to come out of the shadows and contribute to our country in significant ways. Twelve years later, DACA recipients who started as high school and college students are now building successful careers and establishing families of their own. 

The announcement will allow individuals, including DACA, recipients and other Dreamers, who have earned a degree at an accredited US institution of higher education in the United States, and who have received an offer of employment from a US employer in a field related to their degree to more quickly receive work visas.

Recognizing that it is in our national interest to ensure that individuals who are educated in the US are able to use their skills and education to benefit our country. The administration is taking action to facilitate the employment visa process. For those who have graduated from college and have a high-skilled job offer including DACA recipients and other Dreamers.

Editor’s Note: The above guest column was penned by Congressman Henry Cuellar. It appears in the Rio Grande Guardian with the permission of the author. Cuellar can be reached by email via: Arturo.Olivarez@mail.house.gov

Editor’s Note: Congressman Cuellar was interviewed by reporters at a recent ribbon-cutting ceremony at the Las Americas Roma Logistics & Industrial Park. Cuellar took questions in Spanish and English about the park, international trade, immigration, Mexico’s water debt to the United States, and illegal guns and weapons going into Mexico. Here is the interview:

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