No Borders NewsIllinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul co-led a coalition of 18 state attorneys general, along with the city and county of San Francisco, in filing an amicus brief in a federal appeals court case involving the CHNV humanitarian parole program.
The brief urges the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit to keep the lower court’s decision recognizing the parole program for people from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Venezuela. The program was created by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security under the Biden administration and is described as allowing more than 500,000 people to live and work legally in the United States for two-year periods for urgent humanitarian reasons.
According to the filing, after President Trump took office, an executive order directed DHS to terminate CHNV parole and other Biden-era humanitarian parole pathways. The district court issued a preliminary injunction, saying DHS unlawfully revoked parole status for people in bulk using flawed reasoning, and warned that abruptly ending the program would cause serious harm, including leaving people without legal status or the ability to work.
The Supreme Court stayed that preliminary injunction while the case continues on appeal. In its amicus brief, the coalition argues that ending CHNV parole would separate families, increase risks to recipients, disrupt local and state economies, worsen labor shortages, and threaten public safety.
The Illinois attorney general’s release also points to economic contributions by immigrants in Illinois, including their share of the labor force and the amount of state and local taxes and spending power reported for 2023. The coalition says those impacts support preserving the program while the courts decide the case.