A federal judge in Boston issued a preliminary injunction in a lawsuit filed to stop the U.S. Department of Homeland Security from terminating a Biden-era parole program (CHNV Parole) that was used to facilitate the illegal entry of more than 531,000 citizens from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela into the U.S.
Eleven CHNV noncitizens, seven sponsors, the organizing plaintiff, Haitian Bridge Alliance, and the Justice Action Center sued. The plaintiffs are currently living in California, Georgia, Nebraska, Massachusetts, New York and Wisconsin, according to the lawsuit.
They sued after CHNV parolees received a notice through their U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services online account notifying them that their parole was being revoked. A similar notice was sent to nearly one million released into the U.S. through a Biden-era CBP One phone app, The Center Square reported.
On March 25, DHS published a notification in the Federal Register that effective immediately, it was terminating the CHNV parole program and those without a lawful basis to remain in the U.S. were ordered to self-deport.
DHS also said it “intends to remove promptly aliens who entered the United States under the CHNV parole programs who do not depart the United States before their parole termination date and do not have any lawful basis to remain in the United States. DHS retains its discretion to commence enforcement action against any alien at any time, including during the 30-day waiting period created by this notice.”
CHNV parole status is slated to end April 24.
After a hearing was held last week in a U.S. District Court in Massachusetts, Judge Indira Talwani issued a preliminary injunction Monday halting DHS’s parole revocation, arguing it wasn’t done on a case-by-case basis. The Trump administration, and state attorneys general who sued to end the parole program during the Biden administration, argued it and other Biden parole programs were unlawful because they facilitated the illegal entry of millions of inadmissible foreign nationals en masse instead of assessing actual humanitarian claims on a case-by-case basis under specific circumstances.
Talwani also stayed all individual notices sent to noncitizens that their CHNV parole was revoked pending further court order. The Trump administration is appealing the ruling.
The CHNV parole program was among more than a dozen identified by House Republicans as illegal and used as evidence to impeach former DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. After the Biden administration reversed Trump-era policies and Mayorkas directed federal employees to not enforce some aspects of federal immigration law, record numbers of foreign nationals began illegally entering the country, totaling more than 14 million, The Center Square exclusively reported, including two million who evaded capture.
Biden and Mayorkas implemented what they called a “lawful, safe and orderly means of traveling to the United States” through the parole programs and through hundreds of commercial international flights funded by the U.S. taxpayer, The Center Square reported. DHS claimed those being admitted to the U.S. were vetted for national security and public safety reasons, which numerous inspector general reports and congressional investigations found to be untrue.
While Mayorkas claimed the parole process would lower illegal border crossings, more than three million illegally entered the U.S. or attempted illegal entry from CHNV countries, The Center Square exclusively reported. They totaled more than the population of 20 individual U.S. states.
More than one million were from Venezuela, including members of the terrorist organization Tren de Aragua, whose criminal activity has been confirmed in at least 22 states, The Center Square exclusively reported. The Trump administration is prioritizing finding and removing TdA members as well as others it’s designated as members of foreign terrorist organizations.
Talwani argued that it is not “in the public interest to summarily declare that hundreds of thousands of individuals are no longer considered lawfully present in the country.”
The Trump administration argues they were never lawfully present in the U.S. and pose a danger to society and drain on public resources. As the border crisis worsened, multiple Democratic governors and mayors called on the Biden administration for financial assistance, and received it, in response to local resources being drained and law enforcement overwhelmed by violent crimes directly tied to CHNV parolees. Multiple reports revealed how Mayorkas’ parole programs enabled violent crimes to be committed against Americans, The Center Square reported.
