The Supreme Court ruled unanimously Monday that immigrants who entered the country unlawfully and were granted a temporary stay for humanitarian reasons do not become qualified to seek permanent residency.
As many as 400,000 immigrants are granted temporary protected status in the U.S., so they’re permitted to stay because of dangerous conditions or disasters in their native states.
Many would like legal permanent resident status, usually called a green card. But lower courts divided over whether individuals who entered the country illegally fulfill a need for the law which states they have to have been”inspected and admitted or paroled into the United States.”
Jose Santos Sanchez, who entered the country unlawfully in 1997, contended that being granted temporary protected status in 2001 fulfilled that requirement for him.
However, Justice Elena Kagan, composing for her unified colleagues, said the law was clear it didn’t.
“Sanchez was not lawfully admitted, and his TPS does not alter that fact,” she wrote. “He therefore cannot become a permanent resident of this country.”
At oral argument in the case, conservative justices said a lawyer for the Justice Department appeared reluctant in opposing the lawsuit brought by Sanchez and his wife, Sonia Gonzalez. The situation was inherited from the Trump government, and separated the Biden government from its allies calling for leniency in immigration issues.
The couple is somewhat typical of people who seek permanent status. They’re natives of El Salvador who have lived as a married couple in New Jersey for at least 20 years. They have four sons, the youngest of whom was born in america.
Sanchez and Gonzalez entered the nation separately in 1997 and 1998. They applied for and obtained temporary protected status in 2001 due to conditions in El Salvador. It’s one of 12 countries on a U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services list for TPS eligibility.
Sanchez has worked for Viking Yachts since he’s been in america, and his firm was enthusiastic about him getting a green card. Sanchez then applied on behalf of his spouse.
However, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services denied them the change in position since they hadn’t been”admitted” into the nation. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit agreed.
Lawyers for Sanchez claimed that was a constrained reading of this law. But Kagan said it wasn’t up to the court to determine that what the law does”is not enough.”
She noted that it doesn’t mean that everybody with temporary protected status is barred from seeking permanent lawful status. As an example, she wrote, a foreign national who entered the country legally on a tourist visa, but stayed on for many months after the visa’s expiration, would satisfy with the requirement he entered the country legally.
And Congress can change the law to assist those like Sanchez, she said:”Legislation pending in Congress would do just that.”
The Case is Sanchez v. Mayorkas.
