(Robert Jonathan, Headline USA) Under new legislation proposed in Congress, temporary visitors to the U.S. who illegally overstay their visas would automatically lose a sizable cash deposit for violating immigration law.
On Thursday, U.S. Sen. JD Vance, R- Ohio, introduced the Timely Departure Act that, if enacted, would require “non-immigrant visa recipients,” subject to certain exceptions, to pay a lump sum to the Department of Homeland Security ranging from $5,000 to $15,000 before entering the U.S.
The incentivizing bond becomes refundable upon the foreign national’s punctual departure in accordance with visa requirements.
DHS keeps the money, however, if a visa holder fails to return to his or her home country on time.
Similar to a fine, the proceeds then get deposited into a designated Immigration and Detention Enforcement Account set aside for that purpose, including deportation measures.
Vance’s legislative crackdown would also serve to bar any visa overstayer from applying for asylum after that person’s paperwork deadline established on or about when they arrived here legally expires.
In a statement, the pro-Trump, populist senator explained that “America is a welcoming nation, but we are also a nation of laws. There are millions of people in this country who have abused our visa system and circumvented our legal immigration process.”
He added that “It is a slap in the face to the working-class Ohioans whose wages are suffering – I will not stand for it. I’m proud to introduce this legislation and bring some sanity to our broken immigration system.”
That special account could wind up being flush with cash since there are, by some estimates, approximately 700,000 visa overstayers every year.
While the institutional left typically insists that America is systemically racist, people from all over world still want to come here. And based on the above-referenced numbers, when they get here, legally or illegally, they seldom want to leave.
Realistically, with Democrats narrowly in control of the Senate, and the open-borders, deportation-averse, catch-and-release, stealth-amnesty Democrat Biden administration currently in charge of the executive branch, it’s unlikely that Vance’s bill can, for now, gain traction.
Election 2024 could flip the script, obviously.
“Today, there are anywhere from 11 to 22 million illegal aliens living in the U.S. Estimates have repeatedly projected that about half of all illegal aliens living in the country arrived on visas and subsequently overstayed,” Breitbart News reported on Thursday.
