In The Washington Post, columnist Greg Sargent points to President-elect Biden’s ambitious immigration agenda, reported this week by CBS News, and his selection of Ron Klain as his chief of staff. "All this suggests that the Biden administration is not primarily viewing these reversals as politically treacherous territory to be carefully tiptoed around," Sargent writes.

Most, if not all, of the proposed changes have bipartisan support, as we outlined in our own immigration priorities framework for the Biden administration. This is an opportunity for the president-elect to strengthen his coalition.

We’re coming up on our 1,000-person cap for next week’s Leading the Way convening, so register now and join us from 3-5 p.m. ET daily from Nov. 16-19. You’ll hear from 39 speakers across 13 conversations on the post-election path forward, American identity amid polarization, the new economics of immigration and more. 

Welcome to Friday’s edition of Noorani’s Notes. If you have a story to share from your own community, please send it to me at [email protected].

MULTIPLE ATTEMPTS – President Trump’s use of Title 42, a federal public health act, to expel migrants to Mexico immediately after they cross the border has led to an increase in repeated border crossing attempts — fueling business for smugglers and leading to a greater number of expulsions by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), Laura Gottesdiener and Sarah Kinosian report for Reuters. Three men who identified themselves as smugglers "told Reuters they save about $1,000 or more each time U.S. Border Patrol expels one of their Central American clients at the Mexican border rather than returning them back by plane to their home countries." If I had to summarize the Trump administration’s immigration policy over the last four years, it would have to be Make Smugglers Great Again. Because without a comprehensive approach to Central American
migration, they are the only ones winning here.

"ONE SECOND CHANCE" – Bounchan Keola, a 39-year-old immigrant from Laos, was on the front lines of a major California wildfire last month as an incarcerated firefighter — a dangerous and essential job that resulted in a near-death injury, Sam Levin writes for The Guardian. Days later, California prison officials transferred Keola to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) custody, where he now faces deportation to a country he left when he was 4. "Keola grew up a U.S. permanent resident, and is the latest refugee to face deportation as a result of California’s controversial policy of transferring certain foreign-born prisoners to [ICE] after they’ve completed their prison sentences, a practice governor Gavin Newsom has supported." It’s also unclear whether Laos will accept Keola, a member of the Khmu ethnic minority, as the country
does not recognize the citizenship of Khmu refugees. Said Keola: "All I know is I’m American. I’ve never thought of myself not being a citizen. I’m just asking for that one second chance."

CATHOLIC HOSPITALITY – For the last eight years, the Casa de Paz hospitality house in Denver has helped ICE detainees who have been released on parole or are awaiting asylum hearings by providing them temporary shelter and helping make arrangements to return them to their families or sponsors — help that’s as critical as ever amid the pandemic. "As of September, volunteers had donated more the 424,619 frequent flyer miles to help detainees reunite with their families or sponsors," Jean Lotus writes in U.S. Catholic. During the pandemic, the program developed a pen pal and phone visitation program which reaches a dozen detention centers nationwide. Founder Sarah Jackson said, "The Bible warns against being lukewarm. When you’re not numb, when you can feel something, you can be enraged and use that anger in a righteous way, to speak up and
walk beside immigrants, demanding better treatment for all."

‘LOVE OUR NEIGHBOR’ – Brooklyn Stephens, a volunteer with Refugee Hope Partners in North Carolina, writes in Wake Weekly [paywall] that her meeting with a Guatemalan immigrant at the border helped her realize the importance of taking care of vulnerable refugees from a faith perspective. "We have an idea as Christians, particularly in America, that we have to stay committed to a certain political ideology, depending on where we grew up or what those around us think. But we have to go back and ask ourselves what has Jesus commanded. Which is to align our hearts with His — to love God with everything in us and to love our neighbor as ourselves. When we see another human being as something other than a person made in the image of God — a person with worth and dreams and a purpose — we have missed what’s really important."

MORE NATURALIZATIONS – Last year saw the highest number of green card holders becoming U.S. citizens in over a decade, with more than 843,000 immigrants taking the Oath of Allegiance. Per Jo Craven McGinty in The Wall Street Journal: "This year, the cost of becoming a naturalized citizen was expected to nearly double in October — which might have motivated some green-card holders to get their citizenship — but the proposed increase was delayed after immigrant-rights organizations sued. It’s also not unusual for naturalization increases to occur near a presidential election, [University of California, Berkeley sociologist Dr. Irene Bloemraad] said, pointing to ‘huge spikes’ around the 1996, 2000 and 2008 elections."

MEXICAN REFORMS – As of Wednesday, the Mexican government is prohibiting its federal officials from keeping children in immigrant detention facilities, Christopher Sherman with the Associated Press reports. "Under the changes, Mexico shifts responsibility for housing child migrants and their families to the country’s family development agency and away from the National Immigration Institute, which is responsible for immigration enforcement and runs the detention centers." Last year, Mexico detained more than 50,000 migrant children, mostly from Honduras and Guatemala.

Thanks for reading,

Ali