Ding Dong the Witch is dead!
On March 9, 2021, the Biden administration announced that it was withdrawing all appeals and other petitions relating to the Public Charge Rule. The next day, the United States Supreme Court accepted the Biden administration’s withdrawal and thus ended the dreaded Public Charge Rule.
The former Trump administration attempted to thwart legal immigration with the rule. The rule required certain categories of immigrants to submit a mountain of evidence demonstrating that the applicant or beneficiary had never received any sort of public benefit and should their petition or application be approved they were unlikely to become dependent on public benefits. The rule was highly controversial because it was released fairly shortly after Trump called certain African countries “sh*tholes,” and stated that the United States should focus on helping immigrants from predominately white countries. The rule went through several rounds of litigation before a final rule was implemented in March of 2020.
On the campaign trail, then presidential candidate Joe Biden promised to end the Public Charge Rule within the first 100 days of his presidency. After he was inaugurated in January 2021, the immigration community became skeptical after several weeks passed without any indication from the Department of Justice or the desk of the President that the rule would be removed entirely. Finally, on March 10th the news we have been waiting for arrived when the Supreme Court announced that it accepted the Biden administration’s motions to withdraw.
Take a moment to breath, and then the fight continues for more just immigration laws!
