The bulk of migrants who qualify for the Biden administration’s mass parole program are flying into Florida, subpoenaed documents released Tuesday by the House Homeland Security Committee show.
Under President Biden’s controversial border policy, migrants from Cuba, Nicaragua, Haiti and Venezuela who obtain a US sponsor, pass a background check and demonstrate that parole is warranted based on significant public benefit or urgent humanitarian reasons are allowed to fly into US ports of entry, where they will receive work permits and authorization to remain in the country for two years.
The Department of Homeland Security has processed more than 400,000 migrants via the mass parole program.
The documents from DHS obtained by the House Homeland Security Committee cover some 200,000 migrant arrivals over a period from January to August 2023.
These are the top 15 cities that individuals who qualified for the so-called CHNV program flew into during that eight-month span:
1) Miami, Fla.: 91,821
2) Ft. Lauderdale, Fla.: 60,461
3) New York City, NY: 14,827
4) Houston, Texas: 7,923
5) Orlando, Fla.: 6,043
6) Los Angeles, Calif.: 3,271
7) Tampa, Fla.: 3,237
8) Dallas, Texas: 2,256
9) San Francisco, Calif.: 2,052
10) Atlanta, Ga.: 1,796
11) Newark, NJ: 1,498
12) Washington, DC: 1,472
13) Chicago, Ill.: 496
14) Las Vegas, Nev.: 483
15) Austin, Texas: 171
The House panel said the DHS documents also revealed that there were some 1.6 million migrants waiting for approval to fly into the US via the parole program as of October 2023.
“All individuals paroled into the United States are, by definition, inadmissible, including those paroled under the CHNV processes,” DHS noted in one document, according to the committee.
“These documents expose the egregious lengths Secretary [Alejandro] Mayorkas will go to ensure inadmissible aliens reach every corner of the country, from Orlando and Atlanta to Las Vegas and San Francisco,” House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Mark Green (R-Tenn.) said in a statement.
“Secretary Mayorkas’ CHNV parole program is an unlawful sleight of hand used to hide the worsening border crisis from the American people,” he added. “Implementing a program that allows otherwise inadmissible aliens to fly directly into the US –– not for significant public benefit or urgent humanitarian reasons as the Immigration and Nationality Act mandates –– has been proven an impeachable offense.”
Green’s committee first requested the information on the CHNV program in April 2023.
After more than 100 days of delinquency from DHS, the committee issued a subpoena to DHS, at which point the requested documents and information were produced.
Multiple states, including Florida, have sued the Biden administration to block the mass parole program, arguing that it is effectively a new visa program that has no basis in law.
Migrants must make their own travel arrangements under the program guidelines, according to Customs and Border Protection.
The program is open to 30,000 people from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Cuba per month.
