# Plain Language Summary: Protect America First Act

This bill would pause all immigration to the United States for four years and make it much faster and easier to deport people who enter the country without proper documentation. Under current law, people ordered to leave have 90 days to depart, but this bill cuts that to 30 days. More dramatically, the bill would allow immigration officials to deport people who entered illegally without requiring them to have a hearing before an immigration judge—a significant change from how the system currently works. Anyone caught entering without valid documents would be immediately detained and deported within 30 days, with no court appearance necessary.

The bill also takes aim at what supporters call "sanctuary cities"—places where local police don't actively help federal immigration enforcement. It would cut federal funding from any city or state that has policies preventing police from sharing information about someone's immigration status with federal authorities. Additionally, the bill would complete the southern border wall, end "chain migration" (where immigrants can sponsor relatives to come), and eliminate DACA (the program protecting people brought to the country as children). It would also stop federal funding to Central American and South American countries, presumably to discourage migration from those regions.

The bill includes provisions requiring Immigration and Customs Enforcement to notify crime victims if someone charged with a violent crime is in immigration custody and to keep them informed about deportation efforts. It also expands detention requirements for immigrants charged with crimes involving death or serious injury. Essentially, this legislation represents a comprehensive hardline approach to immigration: stopping new arrivals, speeding up deportations, removing legal protections that currently exist, and pressuring local governments to cooperate with federal immigration enforcement or lose funding.

Protect America First Act

Greene, Marjorie Taylor

Protect America First Act This bill temporarily bars noncitizens from entering the United States and addresses related issues. During the four-year period starting from this bill's enactment, any alien who unlawfully enters the United States at a port of entry without proof of citizenship shall be inadmissible. The bill requires the detention of certain aliens (generally, those not legally present in the United States) who have been charged with any crime resulting in the death or serious bodily injury of another. Furthermore, a state or local government shall be ineligible for certain federal assistance if that government has a law or policy that (1) violates certain laws about sharing immigration status information with federal officials, or (2) prohibits law enforcement from obtaining immigration status information from any individual. The bill also requires (1) the Department of the Treasury to establish a fund for a barrier along the U.S.-Mexico border, and (2) the Department of Homeland Security to construct such a barrier by December 31, 2021. The bill also reinstates certain immigration-related executive orders, including an order that generally barred nationals of certain countries (such as Somalia and Sudan) from entry, while rescinding other orders, including an order promoting access to voting for individuals legally entitled to vote. The bill also rescinds orders establishing the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) and Deferred Action for Parental Accountability (DAPA) programs. (Generally, DACA defers the deportation of eligible aliens who entered the United States as minors, while DAPA is a similar program for the alien parents of U.S. citizens or permanent residents.)