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News > World

Obama Launches Campaign to Naturalize 9 Million Immigrants

  •  The announcement comes in an electoral season that has seen immigrants and undocumented people degraded and vilified by such Republican candidates like Donald Trump.

    The announcement comes in an electoral season that has seen immigrants and undocumented people degraded and vilified by such Republican candidates like Donald Trump. | Photo: Martha Benedict - Chicanoart.org

Published 18 September 2015
Opinion

Immigrant organizations say this is an opportunity to organize in the face of rising xenophobic and racist rhetoric from Republican candidates. 

The White House launched a major national campaign Thursday to speed up citizenship access to an estimated 8.8 million eligible immigrants in what some see as a strategic move ahead of next year’s presidential election.

The national campaign claims the government will collaborate with immigrant and refugee organizations across the country to provide personalized assistance as well as legal services, including preparatory citizenship workshops and practice tests that will be sent to people’s cell phones.

In its first week alone, the campaign will organize 70 citizenship outreach events and 200 naturalization ceremonies to register more than 36,000 new citizens, according to the Obama administration.

RELATED: After 9/11: Linking Migration to Terrorism, Militarizing the US-Mexican Border

The announcement comes in an electoral season that has seen immigrants and undocumented people degraded and vilified by Republican candidates, in particular Donald Trump.

This has led analysts to suspect that Obama’s move is part of a political strategy to explicitly distinguish Democrats from Republicans and gain more crucial votes among Latinos ahead of next year’s presidential election.

“We want to build off the negative energy,” said Tara Raghuveer, policy and advocacy director for the National Partnership for New Americans, a coalition of immigrant groups holding dozens of events during the campaign. “People are hearing the hate and racist xenophobia on the national stage from the presidential candidates. They are angry, and this is an opportunity for us to organize.”

To be eligible for citizenship, people must have been legal permanent residents for at least three years and, in most cases, five.

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