The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is now allowing Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials to review the parole status of migrants brought into the U.S. under the Biden administration’s expanded use of humanitarian parole, paving the way for their potential rapid removal, furthering President Donald Trump’s campaign pledge of “mass deportations” of people in the country illegally.
In an internal memo signed Thursday and obtained by Fox News Digital, acting DHS Secretary Benjamine Huffman outlined recent measures to lift restrictions on expedited removal. This authority enables the swift deportation of recently arrived migrants who do not claim asylum or fail to meet preliminary requirements. The policy now applies nationwide to migrants who have been in the U.S. for less than two years.
The new memo says that with those expanded powers, any immigrant whom DHS knows who could be put on expedited removal, but has not, should have their case reviewed and “consider, in exercising your enforcement discretion, whether to apply expedited removal.” The memo was first reported by The New York Times. “This may include steps to terminate any ongoing removal proceeding and/or any active parole status,” it says.
It also states that any immigrant granted parole under a policy paused, modified, or terminated by the Trump administration may be subject to removal proceedings at the discretion of the officers who can then “review the alien’s parole status to determine, in exercising your enforcement discretion, whether parole remains appropriate in light of any changed legal or factual status.” The memo further states that parole is a “positive exercise of enforcement discretion to which no alien is entitled and that parole ‘shall not be regarded as an admission of the alien.’”
This policy change could affect migrants who were granted parole at ports of entry after scheduling an appointment through the CBP One app or those authorized for travel under parole processes for Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans (CHNV). Additionally, it may apply to individuals admitted under the administration’s parole programs for nationals from Ukraine and Afghanistan.
Nearly 1.5 million migrants were admitted under the CBP One app and CHNV parole programs, both of which were terminated by Trump on his first day in office. While the Biden administration defended the expanded “lawful pathways” as a strategy to curb illegal border crossings, Republicans criticized the move, accusing the administration of overstepping its limited parole authority and admitting migrants who would not have been eligible to enter legally.
Huffman’s memo builds on an earlier directive this week ordering a review of parole usage. The memo underscores that the statute requires parole to be granted on a “case-by-case basis,” a provision Republicans have accused the previous administration of violating. It emphasizes that parole is “a limited use authority, applicable only in a very narrow set of circumstances.”
