Sponsor
Eric Stephen Schmitt
Senator · R-MO
Senator · R-MO
The bill centralizes and clarifies DHS authority to speed and tighten expedited inadmissibility processing — which can reduce delays and raise one evidentiary safeguard — but it expands the scope of expedited removal, strips certain protections, concentrates removal power in DHS, and risks interagency inconsistency and reduced oversight.
Ports-of-entry personnel and travelers: DHS gets clearer, centralized authority to expedite inadmissible cases, which can speed processing at ports of entry and reduce backlog for federal employees processing arrivals.
Noncitizens subject to certain expedited processes: raising the evidentiary standard to 'clear and convincing' increases the burden of proof for some determinations and can reduce erroneous expedited removals for some individuals.
Large groups of noncitizens: the bill expands who can be subject to expedited removal and removes named statutory exceptions (including deletion of subparagraph (F)), increasing the risk that immigrants will be removed without full immigration proceedings or protections.
Immigrants and oversight stakeholders: concentrating sole, largely unreviewable removal discretion in the Secretary of Homeland Security reduces judicial and agency review, decreasing oversight and increasing risk of unchecked removal decisions.
Immigrants and case-processing systems: transferring functions from the Attorney General (and DOJ) to DHS risks inconsistent procedures, complicates coordination with immigration courts and DOJ, and could produce implementation and fairness problems across agencies.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Concentrates expedited removal authority in the DHS Secretary, broadens inadmissibility references, removes a statutory exception, and raises one screening evidentiary standard.
Official title: Amend section 235 of the Immigration and Nationality Act to treat inadmissible aliens more consistently regardless of their country of nationality, and for other purposes.
Introduced May 20, 2025 by Eric Stephen Schmitt · Last progress May 20, 2025
Expands expedited removal rules by giving the Secretary of Homeland Security sole, unreviewable authority to apply expedited removal to noncitizens inadmissible under section 212(a)(6) or 212(a)(7) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, and by deleting a named statutory exception. The bill also replaces references to the Attorney General with the Secretary of Homeland Security and raises one evidentiary standard from "a significant possibility" to "clear and convincing evidence." These changes concentrate decision-making at DHS, broaden the scope of inadmissibility references used for inspection and expedited removal, alter standards used in screening, and remove a statutory exception, which together will speed and expand the executive branch’s ability to order removals without review in many cases and change protections available to certain arriving or interdicted noncitizens.