THE ISSUE: For more than seventy years our immigration laws have included a provision called "registry" that gives immigrants who have continuously resided in the United States since the registry date an opportunity to adjust their status. Legislation has been introduced to update the cutoff date for this "statute of limitations," now set at 1972. While the registry date has been updated six times since 1929, it has not been changed since 1986. Refusing to update the registry provision undermines the long-established principles behind the law. Because of the 1996 immigration laws, updating the registry date is especially needed to correct a miscarriage of justice against a group of people known as “late legalization applicants.”

BACKGROUND: The registry date has been part of immigration law since 1929, granting the opportunity for people who have resided continuously in the U.S. since the registry date to become permanent residents. Eligible people must prove that they have resided in the U.S. for every year since the registry date, that they have a good moral character, that they are not ineligible for citizenship, and that they are not inadmissible as criminals, “procurers,” subversives, narcotic law violators or aliens smugglers. Updating the registry date is important for the following reasons:

Preserving a history of fairness: The registry date has been used to preserve fairness and to recognize the valuable contributions of certain long-term residents of the United States. The law needs to be updated periodically, as has been done in the past, because it only applies to people who have been in the U.S. since the specific selected date. If the registry date is not advanced then the law becomes obsolete. If the date had never been advanced, the provision would be useless: Only those people who continuously resided in the United States since the original registry date of May 19, 1921 would be eligible to apply. Instead, Congress has advanced the registry date six times since 1929 to ensure that it would be used by new classes of long-term residents whose value and contribution to the U.S. warrant an opportunity to have their status recognized.

The registry date has not been changed since the Reagan Administration proposed and passed the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 (IRCA). The cut-off date of January 1, 1972 set by that law is too remote to be effective. Not since 1952 has Congress allowed more than a 28-year gap between the cut-off date and the current year.

Correcting an injustice of the 1996 law: In addition to moving the registry date to 1972, the Reagan Administration also passed a "legalization program" that allowed persons who resided in the U.S. illegally since before 1982, or who worked in agriculture during 1985 and 1986, to apply to become legal permanent residents. Undocumented immigrants had one year to apply. Many missed their opportunity to legalize through no fault of their own, due to the Immigration and Naturalization Services’ (INS) misinterpretation of the law. Courts repeatedly decided in several class-action suits that the INS had incorrectly interpreted the law. Affected immigrants were given work authorization while INS was forced to properly consider their applications.

However, Congress acted in 1996 not to remedy the wrong, but to strip away the courts' authority to grant relief for most of the wronged legalization applicants. Section 377 of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act of 1996 (IIRAIRA) stripped the courts of jurisdiction over the claims of immigrants denied access to the legalization provision. Because of the 1996 law, some of these immigrants no longer were entitled to work authorization or protection from deportation. With their work authorization expiring, many reverted back to undocumented status and were threatened with deportation. Furthermore, Congress did not update the registry provision in 1996. Updating the registry cutoff date is the simplest way and most equitable way to get the INS bureaucracy to do what it should have done 13 years ago.

In recognition of the contributions of long-term residents to our society and to our booming economy, several members of Congress introduced legislation in the 106^th Congress that would have updated the current registry date: The Latino and Immigrant Fairness Act (S. 2912), introduced by Senators Edward Kennedy (D-MA), Harry Reid (D-NV), Richard Durbin (D-IL), and Robert Graham (D-FL) would have updated the registry date to 1986. The bill would also have restored Section 245(i) and create NACARA parity. Introduced by Senators Harry Reid (D-NV) and Edward Kennedy (D-MA), S. 2407 would have changed the registry date to 1986, and advanced the date one year until it reaches 1991 in the year 2006. Introduced by Representatives Sheila Jackson-Lee (D-TX) and Luis Gutierrez (D-IL), H.R. 4172 would have changed the registry date to 1986.

Instead of updating the registry date, the 106th Congress passed, and the President signed into law, the Legal Immigration and Family Equity Act (LIFE), that includes two provisions: one would allow the adjustment of status of certain late legalization class members, and another would grant protection from deportation and work authorization to the spouses and children or these late legalization applicants. These late legalization class members were qualified under IRCA in the mid-1980s, but the INS misinterpreted the law. These applicants won the right in court to have their cases properly reviewed, and had been working legally in the United States while their applications were lost in the INS bureaucracy. If INS had processed their applications properly, many, if not most of these immigrants, would already have been citizens. Instead, they fought the immigration bureaucracy for more than a decade and, prior to the passage of LIFE, were threatened with deportation.

AILA’S POSITION: Updating the registry date makes sense and is necessary to preserve fairness. While LIFE included a provision that allowed certain late legalization class members to adjust their status, AILA continues to support an update in the registry date. The LIFE provision did not include all of the late legalization class members. Furthermore, there are others who have been in the United States for fourteen years or more and have become valuable employees and members of their communities. They have been working, supporting their families, and paying taxes. These people have strong ties and equities in the U.S., and, at a time when our economy needs more workers, it makes no sense to spend limited enforcement resources to apprehend and banish immigrants who have strong ties to their communities and are trained and experienced workers.

21IP1006  06/07/01