Advocates worry anti-immigrant provisions will make way into spending bill

Faith-based groups are voicing worries that lawmakers will extend already existing provisions to further prevent immigrants from entering the U.S. as legislators haggle over what will be included in a historic $260 billion spending bill focused on health care and the environment.

Several Catholic organizations in the 55-member Interfaith Immigration Coalition voiced worries Aug. 3 that some lawmakers will attempt to include an extension of a Trump-era rule in the Inflation Reduction Act.

The legislation is the most-watched item in Congress as members gets ready to go on summer recess in early August and includes major tax credits and subsidies for health care and the environment.

But some worry that Republican lawmakers will try to insert an extension of the Title 42 of the Public Health Safety Act, which keeps asylum-seekers from entering the U.S. citing health concerns caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

The Trump administration began using the Title 42 rule in March 2020 as knowledge of rising infections of the coronavirus began to surge in the U.S. -- and around the world. Title 42 has not been lifted and federal court rulings have kept it in place.

With Title 42 still in place, "there is no need to legislatively extend the policy," the Interfaith Immigration Coalition said in an Aug. 3 news release. "Bills and amendments that claim to temporarily extend Title 42 not only drive harmful, xenophobic rhetoric, but also impose such unattainable requirements that they would make seeking asylum virtually impossible."

"The member organizations of the (coalition) remain unequivocal in their faith-rooted support of vulnerable people that have been forced to flee their homes, and in the legal and human right to seek asylum," the release said.

The coalition said it has been urging Senators to vote "no" on any amendment "that would harm immigrant communities and derail this important and historic bill that the nation so desperately needs."

Sr. Áine O'Connor, of the Sisters of Mercy of the Americas, said that "anti-immigrant amendments do not belong in this bill, and using immigrants as pawns to score political points denies their essential dignity, belonging and ultimately our own realization of our common humanity and need for one another."

Immigrants are critical contributors to the economy, she said, adding that fearmongering in any language lawmakers introduce into the bill will cause an atmosphere of hate that could cost lives.

"We need only reflect on today's third anniversary of the racist and violent mass shooting in El Paso to see the results of such fanning of white nationalism and anti-immigrant rhetoric," she said.