Immigration parole: What is it and who’s getting it?

Ukrainians fleeing war, Afghans airlifted out of Kabul, Venezuelans escaping political crisis – many recent arrivals to the United States have legally entered through a process called parole.

Parole isn’t technically an immigration status. It’s a temporary state for noncitizens without the promise of long-term residence.

The Department of Homeland Security this month announced that a parole process for Venezuelans will now be extended to vetted nationals of Cuba, Haiti, and Nicaragua – and their immediate family members. Up to 30,000 individuals from those countries, per month, may come to stay and work for up to two years, but must secure a sponsor for financial support and arrive by airplane.

What is parole?

Parole is a permission of entry that allows certain noncitizens to stay in the U.S. temporarily. Parole can be granted in numerous ways, including at ports of entry like those along the southern border or through a major parole program like the federal Uniting for Ukraine initiative.

The Immigration and Nationality Act states that parole may be granted on a “case-by-case basis for urgent humanitarian reasons or significant public benefit.”

An example of “public benefit” could mean granting someone entry to testify as a witness in a trial. The Uniting for Ukraine program, by contrast, has provided a “humanitarian” parole process for Ukrainians since spring 2022. Many Afghans have also been granted humanitarian parole since summer 2021.

To remain in the country lawfully, parolees will need to apply for asylum, pursue other immigration pathways, or try to extend their parole before it expires.

How does parole compare with asylum or refugee status?

Unlike asylum and refugee status, which may be granted to noncitizens who were persecuted or fear persecution in their country of origin, parole does not provide a direct path to lawful permanent residence in the U.S. 

Generally, parolees aren’t guaranteed federal public benefits, though there are exceptions. Parolees can apply for work authorization, but that can take a while.

Jill Marie Bussey, director for public policy at Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service, a resettlement agency, says it’s been “encouraging” to see U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, an agency that grants parole, streamline and expedite work authorization applications within the last year. In the past, she says, “it would take six, eight months – not six, eight weeks – and sometimes even longer than that” for parolees to secure work permits.

That hints at a larger question, she adds: “How do they stabilize themselves once they enter the community?” 

How political is parole? 

The U.S. has granted parole for decades. The newly announced process for Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans, and Venezuelans is part of a broader suite of border changes as Title 42 remains in place. (That court-challenged, pandemic-era public health order was invoked by the Trump administration. Critics say Title 42’s expulsion of asylum-seekers, among other noncitizens at the border, violates their legal right to seek asylum.)

“I think parole is a really useful mechanism for getting people to safety,” even if it doesn’t provide a path to permanence, says Suchi Mathur, senior litigation attorney at the American Immigration Council, an immigrant advocacy group.

However, she adds, the new rules around the expulsion of noncitizens from those four countries seeking protection across the border is “weaponing” the parole process. (If they attempt to cross the border unlawfully, they face expulsion to Mexico.) Requiring these parole-seekers to secure a passport and plane fare means “more well-off immigrants will be privileged.”

Ms. Mathur also argues the monthly cap – 30,000 from four nations, total – “doesn’t really reflect the number of people who are fleeing persecution with very legitimate claims.” 

By contrast, Simon Hankinson disagrees with the expansion of parole and favors more enforcement of immigration law at the border.  

“We can’t solve the social problems – and the economic problems, the political problems – of every country on Earth,” says Mr. Hankinson, senior research fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation’s Border Security and Immigration Center.

Plus, he argues, parole is meant for rare, case-by-case use: “I object to this unprecedented attempt to solve a problem through extralegal – or extra-constitutional – means that doesn’t really have a simple solution.”

On that last point, all sides might agree: Little about immigration law is simple.