President Joe Biden’s expanded parole system has drawn over a million migrants alone to the U.S. since January 2023, federal data shows. Yet a major flaw has already been found within the administration’s parole pathway — an inability to track parolees’ status once they enter the U.S.
Roughly 460,000 migrants arrived in the U.S. on commercial flights after the Biden administration granted them parole, while another 630,000 sought parolee status at ports of entry through the CBP One mobile app, according to new Customs and Border Protection (CBP) data. Since 2021, Biden’s administration has granted parole for tens of thousands of Afghans despite there not being any system in place to actually track the migrants once they make it to America, the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) found in May. (RELATED: 5 Illegal Immigrants Charged With Kidnapping 14-Year-Old Girl In American Heartland)
The OIG report raises significant questions, including whether the administration keeps track of all those who have recently been granted parole into the U.S.
YUMA, ARIZONA – MAY 22: Immigrants from Ecuador warm themselves by a fire after sunrise along a gap in the U.S.-Mexico border barrier, as they await processing by the U.S. Border Patrol, after crossing from Mexico on May 22, 2022 in Yuma, Arizona. Title 42, the controversial pandemic-era border policy enacted by former President Trump, which cites COVID-19 as the reason to rapidly expel asylum seekers at the U.S. border, was set to officially expire on May 23rd. A federal judge in Louisiana delivered a ruling May 20th blocking the Biden administration from lifting Title 42. (Photo by Mario Tama/Getty Images)
On Jan. 5 2023, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced a new parole process for Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans who have a “supporter” in the United States, also known as the CHNV Parole Process. Under this parole process, migrants are vetted and authorized to purchase airline tickets where they can enter the country and be granted parole. (RELATED: Flight Docs Reveal Which Cities Are Receiving Migrants Under Biden’s Parole Program)
Also in that month, the Biden administration rolled out the CBP One mobile app, which functions as a scheduling tool in an effort to “incentivize noncitizens to use lawful, safe, humane, and orderly pathways processes.” DHS has encouraged migrants to utilize the app over “taking the dangerous journey to cross unlawfully between ports of entry.”
Over 630,000 migrants have scheduled appointments through the app since its implementation, with over 44,500 being processed in the month of May alone, according to the report. Most migrants being processed through appointments scheduled on the app are Haitian, Cuban, Venezuelan, Mexican and Honduran. (RELATED: Local Authorities Ignored Detainer, Released Illegal Alien convicted Of Sex Crimes Against A Child, ICE Says)
Migrants from Central and South America take part in a caravan attempting to reach the Mexico-US border, while carrying out a viacrucis to protest for the death of 40 migrants in a fire at a detention center in the northern city of Juarez, in Tapachula, Chiapas state, southern Mexico, on April 23, 2023. (Photo by STRINGER / AFP) (Photo by STRINGER/AFP via Getty Images)
Prior to expanding its parole programs in 2023 to address the migrant influx, the Biden administration already greenlit a separate parole initiative for Afghans following the U.S.’ chaotic Afghanistan withdrawal in August 2021.
Through that program, known as Operation Allies Welcome (OAW), roughly 77,000 Afghans have been granted entry into the U.S., according to a recent report. A May 2024 report put together by OIG found that the federal government had no system to track the parole status of the tens of thousands of migrants.
Three DHS offices were responsible for vetting and facilitating the parole of these migrants, including the CBP, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) and the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), OIG found. However, the report found that none of these departments were properly monitoring the expiration of parolees through the OAW.
Since Biden entered office, over 6 million migrants have been encountered at the southern border, according to CBP data. There have been over 1.2 million “gotaways” — individuals who successfully evade border enforcement — between fiscal years 2022-2023. (RELATED: Illegal Immigrant Arrested For 13th Time After Years-Long Crime Spree, ICE Says)
Over the last three fiscal years, over 40,000 illegal migrants with prior criminal records have been apprehended, according to data from the CBP.
“Our enforcement efforts are continuing to reduce southwest border encounters,” Troy Miller, Senior Official Performing the Duties of the Commissioner, said in response to the newly released CBP data Thursday. “But the fact remains that our immigration system is not resourced for what we are seeing.”
DHS and CBP did not respond to a request for comment.
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