Indian-origin US Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal, who has constantly challenged US President Donald Trump’s increasing anti-immigration rhetoric, again took a stand against what she described as the Republican leader’s “attacks on Temporary Protected Status” and “assault” on the country’s legal immigration system.
The commander-in-chief had long aligned with promises to kick off the largest deportation campaign the US had seen, targeting those living in the country illegally, ahead of returning to office for a second time. However, Trump’s latest presidency has also viciously pointed fingers at those embarking on the immigration route through legal pathways. His sharp comments and policy overhauls, especially those aimed at revamping the H-1B visa program—which imports high-skilled foreign talent—have, in turn, prompted other Republicans to take a stand against the work visa category as well.
Earlier this week, however, Jayapal turned the attention to the Trump administration seeking to strip the Temporary Protected Status (TPS) of hundreds of thousands of immigrant Haitians and Syrians. These foreign-born migrants have long been shielded under the program that prevents their deportation owing to safety issues in their countries of origin.
Hosting a shadow hearing titled “Kidnapped and Disappeared: Trump’s Attacks on Temporary Protected Status (TPS)” as the Ranking Member of the Immigration Integrity, Security, and Enforcement Subcommittee, the Democratic representative chose to share her own arduous immigration journey. Recounting her own past experience, she argued in favour of expanding legal pathways to US citizenship.
Indian-origin Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal shares her long immigration journey
Laying emphasis on the complicated path she undertook to acquire citizenship in the US, Pramila Jayapal wrote on X, “It took me 17 years and an alphabet soup of visas to become a US citizen.”
She asserted that as a member of the US Congress, she will continue “working to protect and expand legal pathways to citizenship, including for TPS holders.”
During what was their eighth hearing on “all different aspects of the Trump administration’s assault on immigrants and immigration,” Jayapal highlighted that launching an “attack” on a certain group of immigrants was bound to have repercussions on the entire country, the economies and communities that rely on immigrants in various ways. Underlining that she herself had a “number of different visas” before becoming a US citizen, she noted that at least that legal pathway was available to her, unlike many others facing hurdles today.
“TPS is for people who have been in the United States, and then conditions in their country are so bad that they can’t return,” she said during the hearing, explaining what Temporary Protected Status in the US stands for. “There’s war. There’s all kinds of situations that make it impossible for them to go back… We say, as the United States of America, in a bipartisan way, when the program was formed, that we will not send somebody to their death. We will not send somebody into situations where our own travel advisories from the State Department say it is not safe to go.”
Taking note of the uncertainty and sense of instability faced by many TPS holders or applicants, she continued, “That is the limbo that, frankly, people live in, having to get their statuses renewed every 12 or 18 months and get revetted each time.”
From India to the US: About Pramila Jayapal’s journey
Born in Chennai, India, in 1965, Pramila Jayapal was raised in Indonesia and Singapore. Her multicultural identity eventually expanded, with identity roots tying her to the US, as she came to the country at the age of 16 in 1982 to attend college. Earning a bachelor’s degree from Georgetown University and an MBA from Northwestern University, she ultimately became a US citizen in 2000.
Elected in 2016, the US congresswoman is currently serving her fifth term in Congress, representing Washington’s 7th District, which encompasses most of Seattle and its surrounding areas, including Shoreline, Vashon Island, Lake Forest Park, and parts of Burien and Normandy Park. She has since also become the first South Asian American woman elected to the US House of Representatives and one of only two dozen naturalised citizens currently serving in the country’s Congress.
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