A draft solicitation for new immigrant ID cards has been published by the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) in anticipation of a surge of fresh immigrants in 2016, according to Breitbart.
The draft is for a minimum of four million cards per annum for five years, and up to nine million cards per annum in the early stages, to support potential immigration reform initiatives in the future, with an estimated maximum of 34 million such cards.
USCIS officials say that the requests are merely a contingency in the event of comprehensive immigration reform going ahead and are not indicative of the nature of President Obama’s plan to take executive action on the issue; however, many are not reassured by this caveat.
The order “seems to indicate that the president is contemplating an enormous executive action that is even more expansive than the plan that Congress rejected in the Gang of Eight bill,” says Center for Immigration Studies immigration expert Jessica Vaughan. Breitbart points out that the order for a minimum of four million green cards is an enormous increase, given that the DACA program approved just 600,000 people over its first two years of operation.
John King, the moderator on the CBS show Inside Politics, said yesterday that the news has made Republicans even more angry and frustrated with the president and that there will only be room for confrontation and not compromise should Obama take such action after the November midterm elections.