After their engagement last year, Guadalupe, 21, and Ivan Anguiano, 20, discussed their wedding date for months.
“We wanted to get married in February, but then we said March, and then we said May, and I was like, ‘Let’s just do June’. I just literally opened the calendar and said this date works,” Guadalupe said.
The couple, who live in East L.A., finally settled on a date. They found wedding planning daunting. But an even bigger issue was the idea of Guadalupe, an undocumented immigrant, moving back to her birthplace of Michoacán, Mexico. This would be the way for her to apply for permanent residency after marrying an American citizen.
“Ivan told me that if I were to go back to Mexico he’d go with me, that way I wouldn’t have to be alone,” Guadalupe said.
The Anguianos tied the knot on June 15, unaware they were nearly missing an opportunity that could change their lives.
Two days later, President Biden announced an executive order granting new legal protections to undocumented immigrants married to U.S. citizens.
Biden’s action will allow approximately half a million spouses of U.S. citizens and 50,000 step-children to apply for a pathway to citizenship without leaving the country. According to a government fact sheet, those who pass the Department of Homeland Security’s “case-by-case” assessment get three years to apply for permanent residency.
Applicants must be legally wed as of June 17, 2024, and have lived in the U.S. for at least ten years.
Before the order, some undocumented spouses married to U.S. citizens were already eligible for residency. But obtaining legal status required people who entered the U.S without authorization to move to their home country as they waited to be processed abroad.
For Guadalupe, the new policy means she could stay in L.A. where she’s lived since she was 3 years old without fear of deportation.
It would also help the couple financially, as the new order allows eligible applicants to work for up to three years. Because Guadalupe doesn’t have a work permit, the couple has been struggling to get by on Ivan’s income as a security guard.
“Rent in California is ridiculous. Inflation is horrible, so her working would help a lot, and her being able to pursue different career options [would be great],” Ivan said.
Since the announcement, L.A.-based immigration organizations like the Central American Resource Center of L.A. (CARECEN) have seen an increase in calls and messages from immigrants eager to learn more about the program.
While the Biden administration and the Department of Homeland Security have yet to release the full application requirements, Camila Alvarez, legal director for CARECEN, says it’s important to educate the immigrant community about this program so people know if they’re eligible.
The organization recently hosted a webinar detailing vital information where they informed attendees that the application process is expected to start later this summer. They also warned people about potential extortionists who take advantage of the immigrant community when announcements like this action are made.
“Lawyers and notarios who commit fraud will tell the community, ‘There was a big announcement today and ‘If you give me X amount of money I can get you your green card.’ So it’s a priority for us to get this [correct] information out there,” Alvarez said.
The program comes as Biden aims to appeal to voters months before the presidential election.
Angelica Salas, the executive director of the L.A.-based organization Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights (CHIRLA), says that after Biden’s recent executive order that limited asylum seekers at the U.S.-Mexico border, his administration needed to show he cared for the needs of immigrants and mixed-status families.
“He had a lot of pushback across the board from immigrant organizations [like CHIRLA] saying it was unacceptable that you would use your executive power to deny vulnerable families the ability to come into the country and deny them asylum.”
CHIRLA is part of a national coalition called Value Our Families which advocates for family unification and provided recommendations to Biden’s immigration team even before he assumed office in 2020. Salas, who last month joined representatives of other immigration advocacy groups at the White House to mark the order’s announcement, said that while Biden’s new order for undocumented spouses is a step in the right direction, it doesn’t go far enough.
“It’s a small subset of the entire undocumented community that [Biden] is supporting but nonetheless it’s a good thing,” said Salas.
Guadalupe has followed the news and isn’t surprised by President Biden’s contrasting executive orders and his decision to limit border crossings. “If I were in that situation, I would hate it. You’re trying to escape where you’re from to have a better life, and then all of a sudden it [the law] changes and you can’t come into this country,” Guadalupe said.
Although Guadalupe says she’s eligible and plans on applying for Biden’s new action, she’s not sure what’s going to happen next. Immigration advocates like Salas expect legal pushback from Trump Republicans like his former senior advisor Stephen Miller, who called Biden’s decision “an attack on democracy.”
What Guadalupe is certain of is her excitement about the benefits she could potentially receive from this order.
“This is important to me because after being here for so long, it gives me an opportunity to be able to work,” she said.
