Coalition Letter Urging Congress and Trump Admin. to Fulfill Immigration Campaign Promises

Letter - Friday, January 17, 2025

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A coalition of groups, including the Immigration Accountability Project, sent the following letter to Congressional Leaders in the 119th Congress and the incoming Trump Administration, urging them to fulfill their campaign promises to secure the border and enforce immigration laws.

Dear Congressional and Incoming Trump Administration Leaders,

Congratulations on your victory in the November elections. Late last year, Americans set a clear mandate to execute the largest deportation operation in American history and to fully secure our borders.

The undersigned organizations and individuals write to express and pledge our support in fulfilling the promises you made to the American people. The damage caused by the Biden Administration will not be easy to repair, but several initial steps are needed in rapid sequence to ensure the safety, sovereignty, and well-being of our nation for years to come. Due to limitations in Congressional calendars, the threat of litigation from open-borders zealots, the slow pace of regulatory action, as well as the complexity of promised law enforcement operations, work needs to begin immediately, in earnest.

Mass deportations and secure borders are not only cornerstones of public safety and national security, but they are also a critical means to protect American workers and stop employers from engaging in unscrupulous activities. Most importantly, they are not bargaining chips for other policies or political priorities.

This coalition helped draft and advance bold legislative efforts in the last Congress, including House-passed H.R. 2. We will continue to call for bold statutory reforms to prevent the abuse of our asylum system and our parole laws and end the exploitation of unaccompanied alien children – all of which the Biden Administration relied upon to import illegal aliens into the United States at an industrial scale. H.R. 2 also built upon the resounding success in President Trump’s first term, by seeking to cement into law the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP), the end of catch and release, and critical Safe Third Country provisions that prevent country shopping by asylum seekers. It also resumed construction of the border wall, provided support to U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), and ended the Biden Administration’s reliance on non-governmental organizations to process and transport illegal aliens into communities around the country. Lastly, the bill sought to ensure a lawful workforce with mandatory E-Verify, which would turn off the ‘jobs magnet’ for illegal immigration while protecting jobs for American workers.

As we repeatedly cautioned, H.R. 2 was always a floor, not a ceiling, and was meant to close the loopholes that the Biden Administration repeatedly abused at the border. In the aftermath of the Biden border catastrophe, it is clear that any similar legislative effort through regular order should expand beyond border security, and give U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) innovative tools to enhance the safety of our communities through interior enforcement. Congress should restrict the ability of any future administration to unilaterally shut down enforcement by giving states and localities specific authorization to enact and enforce their own immigration laws, as long as they are in accordance with federal law. It should also expand and enhance a variety of criminal alien removal statutes and crack down on sanctuary jurisdictions that recklessly jeopardize American lives.

Now, with unified control of government and a critical window opening, we also stand ready to help you assemble a bold reconciliation package that reflects President Trump’s commitment to the American people and the very laws that govern and protect our nation. Through reconciliation and regular-order legislation, Congress should:

Provide the resources necessary to operationalize millions of deportations from the interior of the United States each year. Because detention and deportation go hand in hand, this will require an historic number of detention beds, along with significant increases in ICE ERO resources and sufficient resources at the State Department to obtain travel documents for deportees.

• Prioritize the American worker over foreign labor.
• End once and for all the loopholes that the Biden Administration was able to weaponize. While H.R. 2 did this, any similar effort should expand to interior enforcement.
• Not reward lawbreakers. NO amnesty of any kind. (If you have to say it isn’t one, it is.)
• End the funding of non-profits that facilitate illegal immigration, both at home and abroad.

We commend you for maintaining a unified focus on these critical steps and your clear promises to turn them into action. We will stand with you in this historic process, beginning with a reconciliation package focused on securing the border and deporting illegal aliens on an historical scale. The resources provided through reconciliation will be crucial to support President Trump’s bold immigration enforcement efforts, slated to commence via executive action on day one. It is time to bring order to our immigration system and restore fidelity to the rule of law. The American people are waiting.

Sincerely,

Advocates for Victims of Illegal Alien Crime
Eagle Forum
Federation for American Immigration Reform
Heritage Action for America
Immigration Accountability Project
Judicial Watch
National Immigration Center for Enforcement
NumbersUSA
Texas Public Policy Foundation
The Remembrance Project