Trump threatens to eliminate humanitarian parole and CBP One if he wins

The anti-immigrant tone of the Republican election campaign has reached concerning levels. Not content with promising the largest deportation in history, targeting undocumented immigrants in the United States, former President Donald Trump is now threatening to expel 1.3 million immigrants who have arrived legally through two Biden-Harris administration programs: Humanitarian Parole (created in 2022 for Venezuelan immigrants and extended to citizens of Haiti, Cuba, and Nicaragua the following year) and CBP One, a mobile application that allows asylum seekers to schedule appointments at eight ports of entry along the U.S.-Mexico border.

Figures from the Customs and Border Protection Office indicate that between January 2023 and August 2024, around 800,000 immigrants entered the United States via CBP One, while another 530,000 arrived by flight after receiving Parole.

“I would revoke them and expel them. Also, the application is bad, but the worst part is the flights because they try to say, ‘we are going to tighten the border a little,’ and now they have planes loaded with illegal immigrants, people who should not be in our country, going everywhere, to the Midwest, because now every state is a border state,” he said in a phone interview with FOX News. He also sent a message to the beneficiaries of both programs: “Get ready to leave, especially quickly if you are criminals. You will leave very quickly.”

These statements have been especially alarming for immigrants benefitting from the programs, as it challenges the legality of their status and creates uncertainty about what might happen at the polls in November. This zero-tolerance campaign on immigration saw another episode last week, this time led by vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance, who questioned the legality of the 20,000 Haitian immigrants who arrived in Springfield, Ohio.

They are now baselessly accused of eating their neighbors’ pets and received temporary protected status under an Obama administration policy based on a 1990 law, which allows foreigners who have fled natural disasters to live and work in the U.S. Thousands of Haitians were living in the country illegally after the January 2010 earthquake that devastated the island.

“If Kamala Harris illegally waves a wand and says these people are now here legally, I will still call them illegal aliens,” Vance said in response to a reporter’s question after a rally in Raleigh, North Carolina. He added, “An illegal action by Kamala Harris does not make a foreigner legal.”