Trump administration requires all undocumented migrants to register with federal government or face prosecution
Move could help administration accomplish goals of mass deportations
All immigrants in the U.S. illegally will be required to submit fingerprints and register with the federal government, the Trump administration announced on Tuesday, reviving immigration policies previously used to carry out controversial mass detentions and deportations.
“Aliens in this country illegally face a choice,” Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem wrote in a memo of the new policy. “They can return home and follow the legal process to come to the United States or they can deal with the consequences of continuing to violate our laws.”
The directive, which cites the 1952 Immigration and Nationality Act, requires all migrants age 14 or older in the U.S. without authorization for 30 days or longer to apply for registration and fingerprinting.
Failure to comply will be treated as a civil and criminal enforcement priority, with punishments including thousands of dollars in fines and potential prison time.
The federal government said most migrants in the U.S., ranging from legal permanent residents to unauthorized migrants in removal proceedings, have already provided such information.
“However, a significant number of aliens present in the United States have had no direct way in which to register,” U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services writes on its website about the program.
Those over 18 who are registered must keep their registration paperwork “in their possession at all times,” the agency adds.
The Trump administration said it will soon unroll a process to commence registration online.
The U.S. has used such registries in the past, including in the 1940s to hunt suspected communists and carry out the mass internment of Japanese Americans during WWII, though by the 1960s such systems fell into disuse, as the government decided it was too costly and not beneficial enough to attempt to register every undocumented immigrant.
After 9/11, the Bush administration created an immigration registry that disproportionately targeted men and boys from Muslim countries, leading to tens of thousands of deportations.
Critics argued the Trump administration was reviving a set of immigration policies that’ve been shown to be ineffective and threatening in the past.
The new directive, created in response to a January executive order, essentially creates a “nationwide show-me-your-papers regime” where anyone who “appears foreign” could face harassment, Greg Chen, senior director of government relations for the American Immigration Lawyers Association, told The Washington Post.
The national migrant registry is the latest sweeping change the Trump administration has made to U.S. immigration.
The White House has proposed creating a program to sell $5 million “gold card” access to U.S. citizenship to foreign investors.
The administration has also attempted to halt the U.S. refugee resettlement program and drastically limit the ability of border-crossers to claim asylum.