A law firm and nearly a dozen American families are seeking to bring up to 70 children from Haiti to the United States for adoption, using an immigration shortcut known as “humanitarian parole.” That’s almost always a red flag.
Just ask some of the adopted people I represent today, who bear the primary burden of humanitarian visas that expired decades ago and now leave them in a perilous legal status, with deportation on the table.
A client I will call Mary was born in Haiti and brought to the United States at the age of two on “humanitarian parole,” or what’s more commonly known as a humanitarian visa. This shortcut, which potential adoptive parents are turning to more frequently as a tool to skip essential steps in intercountry adoptions, is a growing problem. I recently wrote about the case of Jonas Hubley, and even touched upon the adoptive children of Associate Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett—all of whom used humanitarian visas to facilitate adoptions. But I also have clients whose adoptive parents and their adoption agencies misused humanitarian visas as a way to bring children to the US for adoption—and later failed to secure permanency and citizenship for those kids.
For some of those kids, now adults, deportation to their countries of birth has become a real possibility, particularly when meaningful US immigration reform has failed and we are stuck in a political climate that is virulently anti-immigrant, particularly if you are an adult and are no longer an “adoptable child.”
Bringing a child to the US on humanitarian visa is not at all a good legal immigration solution— it is limited, intended only to provide humanitarian aid or care to a person while temporarily in the United States. As such, it is not intended for adoption.1This is what the US immigration authority has to say about humanitarian parole for prospective adoptive children:
“USCIS does not often approve parole requests for adoption-related cases without evidence of compelling, extenuating circumstances so as to not circumvent important safeguards that exist in regular adoption-based immigration avenues, such as determinations that a child is an orphan or available for intercountry adoption. Additionally, parole does not provide children with the benefits of U.S. immigration status that adoption-based immigration provides. For example, many children who come to the United States based on adoption will be admitted as U.S. citizens or as lawful permanent residents (Green Card holders); however, a child who is paroled will have to take additional steps to get a Green Card or become a U.S. citizen.” Yet adoptive parents quickly exploit it as a means to get kids to the United States when a humanitarian crisis pops up in a developing country like Haiti (or in a war-torn country like Ukraine).
The problem in using non-immigrant visas (e.g., humanitarian visas) is 1) they expire, usually in one or two years; 2) they give prospective adoptive parents an “out” if they change their minds about the adoption and subsequently abandon or “rehome” the kid; and 3) it leaves the child in a perilous immigration status, which may lead to potential deportation if the adoption is never completed or the parents do not follow through with a more complicated process to obtain US citizenship (e.g., it took an act of Congress in 2010 to help Haitian adoptees—also brought to the US then under humanitarian visas—to establish a path for their US citizenship).
Once a kid is here on a humanitarian visa, there is also little if no government oversight to assure that their prospective adoptive parents follow through with 1) securing permanent legal status (i.e., getting a green card) and 2) making sure US citizenship is in place for their adoptive children. Humanitarian parole, in some ways, is used a trial balloon and, if the adoption doesn’t work out as planned or as hoped, parents can just walk away—and they have, in alarming numbers.
Today, my clients who entered the US long ago on humanitarian visas face uncertain and often difficult paths to secure lawful status in the US, let alone qualifying and obtaining US citizenship. For Mary, my client who was born in Haiti and brought here on a humanitarian visa in the late 1990s, her only solution today is to obtain “Temporary Protective Status,” a legal status for certain nationals of specific countries (e.g., Haiti, El Salvador, Sudan, Nepal). TPS, though, is temporary and is about to expire for hundreds of thousands of Haitian nationals. Despite being adopted in a state court by her US citizen adoptive parents years ago, Mary could now face removal from the country if the current US administration does not act to reinstate TPS for Haitian nationals like her.
It’s because of the use of a humanitarian visa to bring her to the US more than two decades ago—combined with the mind-boggling negligence of parents, a government that has little authority to oversee such “adoption” cases, and an unwillingness of Congress today to do anything about it. Think of it this way: as we are seeing once again, prospective adoptive parents are putting immense political and media pressure on Congressional representatives and federal agencies to get foreign-born kids into the US for adoption. But the same federal government and some of the same parents don’t help much at all when the kids—who ultimately become adults—are shipped back to their countries of origin through no fault of their own. It’s inane.
Mary is not the only client caught in immigration limbo because parents used questionable if not illegal shortcuts to bring children to the United States for adoption. I have other clients whose parents simply carried them over the Mexico-US border as infants; or improperly used tourist visas to bring their children to the US for adoption “because it was easier” (an actual quote from a parent, written proudly by the parent in a baby book). At least two other clients with long-expired humanitarian visas have no viable path to secure permanence in the United States, other than to marry a US citizen and follow a complicated and expensive path to get a green card, which costs more than $2,500 in USCIS fees alone.
It’s time to eliminate the use of humanitarian visas as a shortcut to adopt a child. It has been a problem in Ukraine and Nepal, continues to be a problem in Haiti, and will always be a problem for other countries so long as US citizens use devastation and disaster as shortcuts to “build a family.” It’s already past time to fix issues for intercountry adoptees who have been in the US for decades—without citizenship. It’s also past time to eliminate immigration shortcuts that continue to feed that dynamic.
Help! Pitch in for a Trusted Advocate
A friend, colleague, and advocate seeks mutual aid for a financial crisis.
What Expanded ‘Parole in Place’ Means for Intercountry Adoptees
how parole in place currently works, plus how a new expanded policy could significantly benefit some intercountry adoptees, including some of my clients.
Continue Reading What Expanded ‘Parole in Place’ Means for Intercountry Adoptees
Congress Introduces the Adoptee Citizenship Act of 2024
Congress has introduced the Adoptee Citizenship Act of 2024, continuing the fight to secure US citizenship for all adopted people brought to the United States for adoption.
Continue Reading Congress Introduces the Adoptee Citizenship Act of 2024
The Unsettled Issues of Jonas Hubley’s Adoption
Important pieces are missing from the story being told about the adoption and immigration issues for Haitian adoptee Jonas Hubley.
Continue Reading The Unsettled Issues of Jonas Hubley’s Adoption
Notes
- 1This is what the US immigration authority has to say about humanitarian parole for prospective adoptive children:
“USCIS does not often approve parole requests for adoption-related cases without evidence of compelling, extenuating circumstances so as to not circumvent important safeguards that exist in regular adoption-based immigration avenues, such as determinations that a child is an orphan or available for intercountry adoption. Additionally, parole does not provide children with the benefits of U.S. immigration status that adoption-based immigration provides. For example, many children who come to the United States based on adoption will be admitted as U.S. citizens or as lawful permanent residents (Green Card holders); however, a child who is paroled will have to take additional steps to get a Green Card or become a U.S. citizen.”
Leave a Reply