President Obama and the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) recently announced a proposal to allow the undocumented immigrants of U.S. citizen spouses and parents to stay in the country while their hardship waiver applications are being considered.

Hardship waivers are waivers of inadmissibility. Generally, immigrants who are in the U.S. illegally and deported may not return to the U.S. for three to ten years. Through a waiver application, the spouse or child of a U.S. citizen or lawful permanent resident can show that refusing his or her admission to the U.S. would cause extreme hardship to the U.S. citizen. This is a difficult waiver to obtain. It must be supported by strong evidence showing extreme hardship. The hardship caused by family separation is not enough.

The new immigration proposal does not make the hardship waiver process any easier, but it would allow families to stay together while the application is being processed. In other words, even if the immigrant spouse or child entered the U.S. illegally, he or she could stay in the U.S. without risk of deportation until the application is either denied or accepted. As the law currently stands, the illegal immigrant must go back to his or her native country in order to apply for the hardship waiver.

Obama has come under attack for this proposal, with opponents claiming that this is just another part of "administrative amnesty." Yet, the proposal is logical. If the undocumented immigrant's family would be subject to hardship if separated from the immigrant, and waiver cases take approximately six months, then it makes sense to keep the undocumented immigrant in the U.S. for those six months.

Unfortunately, the proposed rule still requires illegal immigrants to return to their native country to obtain their visa if their hardship application is approved.

Source: The Washington Times, "Obama expands 'hardship' waiver for illegal immigrants," Stephen Dinan, Jan. 6, 2012.