In an unprecedented move, the Trump administration granted a path to citizenship for about 4,000 Liberians living legally in the United States on humanitarian programs.
The provision was buried in the $738 billion defense appropriation bill for fiscal year 2020 under “Other Matters.” The bill, which was signed into law on Dec. 20, will allow these Liberians to apply for green cards under Section 7611 of the National Defense Authorization Act titled “Liberian refugee immigration fairness”.
For over two decades, thousands of Liberian immigrants have lived with uncertainty in the US after fleeing civil war in the 1990s and early 2000s. Under both Republican and Democrat administrations, they received temporary respite in the form of humanitarian programs—the Deferred Enforced Departure and Temporary Protected Status programs—issued at the president’s discretion. Over the years they have been shuffled between both programs.
