Florida Among 16 States Suing Biden Administration To Block Amnesty Plan

Photo byJoe Biden, Facebook

After a 24-state coalition sent an amicus brief to the Supreme Court earlier this month, a new 16-state coalition involving some of the same states, like Texas and Florida, is suing the Biden Administration over its ‘parole in place’ policy, otherwise called Keeping Families Together. The 16-state coalition claims that this amnesty plan is “unlawful” and “incentivizes and rewards illegal immigration”.

Due to this, the coalition plans to sue the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, and other officials within the Biden Administration. The full 56-page complaint is available here.

This lawsuit is being spearheaded by Texas’ Attorney General Ken Paxton. His office released a statement on August 23, 2024, claiming that the goal is to put an end to “agency rule granting hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens the ability to ‘parole in place’”, allowing “certain classifications of illegal aliens to gain permanent residency status while remaining in the United States in violation of federal law”.

The press release also claims that, against federal law, Biden’s DHS declared that it would be letting 1.3 million illegal immigrants apply for permanent residency “without first leaving the country and being admitted to re-enter and reside in the country lawfully”. According to Paxton’s office, this is a direct dismissal of federal law and a blatant circumvention of the Constitution.

In addition, Paxton’s office says that this act violates Congress’ Administrative Procedure Act, which defines the use of parole authority. This authority is supposed to be limited and used on a case-by-case basis.

As a result of these issues, Paxton made a request to the court “to grant injunctive relief preventing DHS from implementing the new policy while a trial on the merits is conducted”. On August 26, 2024, the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Texas stayed the DHS from using its parole in place policy for a period of 14 days.

An additional press release from Paxton’s office on August 27, 2024, says that this temporary stay may be extended as litigation continues and that the court found the claims against the DHS potentially being in violation of federal statutory law to be “substantial”. Click here to read the full 9-page stay order.

With America First Legal acting as co-counsel, Paxton and the other 15 state attorneys, including Florida’s Attorney General Ashley Moody, plan to proceed with their lawsuit. As Paxton put it, “This is just the first step. We are going to keep fighting for Texas, our country, and the rule of law”.
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Article by Ema Tibbetts