The Department of Homeland Security is abruptly stopping a program that has allowed close to half a million immigrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela into the United States following allegations of widespread fraud, reported the New York Post.
The advanced travel authorizations for what's been dubbed a humanitarian parole program has allowed up to 30,000 migrants into the U.S. since January 2023.
The move comes after an internal DHS report found thousands of sponsors for the migrants listing fake Social Security numbers and phone numbers, including in some instances those that belonged to people who were dead.
According to documents obtained by the Federation for American Immigration Reform, the internal review also found many sponsors listing the same addresses and many of the applications coming from the same IP address, a numeric designation that identifies its location on the internet.
One IP address in Tijuana, Mexico, was used 1,328 times, according to FAIR. Other examples of fraud included "plugging in the same exact answers on hundreds of applications — in some instances, the same answer was used by over 10,000 applicants."
"Out of an abundance of caution, DHS has temporarily paused the issuance of advanced travel authorizations for new beneficiaries while it undertakes a review of supporter applications," a spokesperson told the Post.
DHS aims to restart the process as quickly as possible "with appropriate safeguards." According to the spokesperson, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement "will investigate and litigate applicable cases in immigration court and make criminal referrals to the Department of Justice."
Dan Stein, the president of FAIR, said in a press release that the internal report shows the priorities of the Biden administration when it comes to illegal immigration: "getting as many people into the country as they can by any means necessary, and at the risk of national security."
He said the program in question was not authorized by congress and was established "in violation of statutory requirements that parole by granted only on a case-by-case basis for explicit national interest or humanitarian purposes."
House Homeland Security Committee Chair Mark Green, R-Tenn., issued a statement Friday calling for the immediate end of the program, which he referred to as the "CHNV program," for immigrants from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela.
"This admission by the Biden-Harris administration vindicates every warning we have ever issued about the unlawful CHNV mass-parole program. It also exposes the lie by administration officials, like now-impeached DHS Secretary [Alejandro] Mayorkas, about the quality and extent of the vetting process — not just for the inadmissible aliens seeking entry, but those attempting to sponsor them," the statement read.
"This is exactly what happens when you create an unlawful mass-parole program in order to spare your administration the political embarrassment and bad optics of overrun borders. The Biden-Harris administration should terminate the CHNV program immediately."
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