President Trump announced on Sunday that he’s developing a “temporary pass” for illegal aliens working in the farming and hospitality industries. But such an effort would open the door for more noncitizens to enter the country illegally, the opposite of what Americans elected Trump to do.
The Biden administration also offered illegal aliens special protections to live and work in the U.S. When Biden revoked the Remain in Mexico Policy, he allowed migrants to remain in the country while their applications were processed. As The Federalist’s John Daniel Davidson noted, such a policy incentivizes bogus asylum applications with a “years-long pass” into the United States as claims make their way through the backlogged immigration courts.
When Trump instated Remain in Mexico during his first term, the “number of illegal crossings plummeted,” Davidson wrote. Under Biden, an estimated 1.7 million evaded border control, and, according to the left-wing American Immigration Council, there were more than 1.4 million affirmative asylum applications pending with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services as of December.
Voters elected Trump to fix the border crisis and are standing by this decision. Polling just last month revealed that 80 percent of Americans support the deportation of illegal immigrants who have committed crimes in the U.S., and a majority of Americans are in favor of deporting all illegal aliens. Yet the carve-outs Trump signaled would once again pave the way for illegal aliens to exploit the protections.
The possibility that immigrants will take advantage of the temporary passes is “certainly” a cause for concern, Center of Immigration Studies (CIS) Director of Research Steven Camarota told The Federalist.
“By saying we’re going to tolerate illegal immigration, it destroys Trump’s credibility, the credibility of enforcement, and takes what is a legal system and basically makes it meaningless,” Camarota said.
The new exemption could give about 2 million illegal immigrants amnesty, CIS found based on numbers from January.
Trump justified his proposed policy by arguing that “we can’t put the farms out of business,” stating that “we’re going to work it so that, some kind of a temporary pass, where people pay taxes, where the farmer can have a little control as opposed to you walk in and take everybody away.”
“From the farmer’s point of view, what’s not to like? He gets the worker he wants at a relatively low price, then the American taxpayer picks up health care and education for his children and so forth,” Camarota said.
“We’re finally seeing real impact on self‑deportations — and now DHS is about to pull the rug out from under the very process that made it possible,” said Marguerite Telford, director of communications for CIS. A million illegal immigrants have left the workforce since March, The Washington Post reported.
Although the details of the “temporary pass” are currently vague, Camarota said the “big thing” about the pass is that it “stifles innovation and the adoption of labor-saving devices.”
“The United States already has an unlimited agricultural guest worker program called H-2A, but it requires you to pay workers a certain amount, treat them in certain ways, and to house them in certain ways,” Camarota said.
During Trump’s interview, he said that “a lot of people aren’t going to do” farm labor jobs.
Between January 2020 and January 2025, 88 percent of the job growth went to immigrants, according to CIS. They also found that Americans will do “just about all” jobs and that “natives outnumber immigrants in all but a handful [of occupations], and in none of them do illegal immigrants constitute a majority.”
Telford noted that the move by Trump seems to contradict his message to the American people that “illegal immigration is illegal.”
“It’s either illegal or it’s not,” she said. “Don’t they want Americans working?”
“If I am asking myself which industries are next to get a pass on hiring illegal workers, then surely those not permitted to work in this country are wondering the same thing,” Telford said.
Abigail Nichols is a correspondent for The Federalist. She was previously the opinion editor for the University of South Florida’s student newspaper, The Oracle. She is now working as the business manager at the University of North Florida’s student-run media outlet, Spinnaker Media, while obtaining a Master’s Degree in Social work.
