Halt on asylum claims blocked
U.S. must resume accepting migrants until case is decided
A federal judge ordered the Trump administration to resume accepting claims in a temporary blow to efforts to clamp down on the migrant caravan.
A federal judge on Monday ordered the Trump administration to resume accepting asylum claims from migrants no matter where or how they entered the United States, dealing at least a temporary setback to the president’s attempt to clamp down on a huge wave of Central Americans crossing the border.
Judge Jon S. Tigar of the U.S. District Court in San Francisco issued a temporary restraining order that blocks the government from carrying out a new rule that denies protections to people who enter the country illegally. The order, which suspends the rule until the case is decided by the court, applies nationally.
“Whatever the scope of the president’s authority, he may not rewrite the immigration laws to impose a condition that Congress has expressly forbidden,” Tigar wrote in his order.
Presidential proclamation
As a caravan of several thousand people journeyed toward the Southwest border, President Donald Trump signed a proclamation Nov. 9 that banned migrants from applying for asylum if they failed to make the request at a legal checkpoint. Only those who entered the country through a port of entry would be eligible, he said, invoking national security powers to protect the integrity of the U.S. borders.
Within days, the administration submitted a rule to the federal register, letting it go into effect immediately and without the customary period for public comment.
But the rule overhauled longstanding asylum laws that ensure people fleeing persecution can seek safety in the United States regardless of how they entered the country. Advocacy groups, including the Southern Poverty Law Center and the American Civil Liberties Union, swiftly sued the administration for effectively introducing what they deemed an asylum ban.
After the judge’s ruling Monday, Lee Gelernt, the ACLU attorney who argued the case, said, “The court made clear that the administration does not have the power to override Congress and that, absent judicial intervention, real harm will occur.”
“This is a critical step in fighting back against President Trump’s war on asylum-seekers,” Melissa Crow, senior supervising attorney for the Southern Poverty Law Center, one of the other organizations that brought the case, said in a statement. “While the new rule purports to facilitate orderly processing of asylum-seekers at ports of entry, Customs and Border Protection has a long-standing policy and practice of turning back individuals who do exactly what the rule prescribes. These practices are clearly unlawful and cannot stand.”
The Center for Constitutional Rights also joined in the suit.
Trump administration officials signaled that they would continue to defend the policy as it moved through the courts.
“Our asylum system is broken and it is being abused by tens of thousands of meritless claims every year,” Katie Waldman, spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security, and Steve Stafford, the Justice Department spokesman, said in a statement.
They said the president has broad authority to stop the entry of migrants into the country.
“It is absurd that a set of advocacy groups can be found to have standing to sue to stop the entire federal government from acting so that illegal aliens can receive a government benefit to which they are not entitled,” they said. “We look forward to continuing to defend the executive branch’s legitimate and well-reasoned exercise of its authority to address the crisis at our southern border.”
Presidents indeed have broad discretion on immigration matters. But the court’s ruling shows that such discretion has limits, said Stephen Yale-Loehr, an immigration scholar at Cornell Law School.
“The ruling is a significant blow to the administration’s efforts to unilaterally change asylum law. Ultimately this may have to go to the Supreme Court for a final ruling,” said Yale-Loehr.
The advocacy groups accused the government of “violating Congress’ clear command that manner of entry cannot constitute a categorical asylum bar” in their complaint. They also said the administration had violated federal guidelines by not allowing public comment on the rule.
Deterring Central Americans
But Trump administration officials defended the regulatory change, arguing that the president was responding to a surge in migrants seeking asylum based on frivolous claims, which ultimately lead their cases to be denied by an immigration judge. The migrants then ignore any orders to leave and remain unlawfully in the country.
“The president has sought to halt this dangerous and illegal practice and regain control of the border,” government lawyers said in court filings.
Trump, who had made stanching illegal immigration a top priority since his days on the campaign trail, has made no secret of his frustration over the swelling number of migrants heading to the United States. The president ordered nearly 6,000 active-duty troops to the border to prevent the migrants from entering.
The new rule was widely regarded as an effort to deter Central Americans, many of whom request asylum once they reach the United States, often without inspection, from making the journey over land from their countries to the border.