Trump moves to end U. S. asylum for some
President imposes a ‘ third country’ rule
WASHINGTON — Reversing decades of U. S. policy, President Donald Trump moved to end asylum protections for most Central American migrants who cross the southern border as he steps up his crackdown on immigration.
Migrants who fail to apply for protection from persecution or torture while in a third country before entering the U. S. would be ineligible for asylum, under a rule set to be published Tuesday in the Federal Register by the Trump administration.
“The large number of meritless asylum claims places an extraordinary strain on the nation’s immigration system,” according to the notice. It also said the claims undermine “humanitarian purposes of asylum” and have worsened human smuggling.
Mr. Trump has focused on cracking down on undocumented immigration — one of his signature issues — for weeks as his 2020 re- election campaign gets underway. He prodded Mexico to take steps to block migrants from crossing into the U. S. after threatening the country with tariffs on goods last month.
Mr. Trump dropped plans for tariffs after a June 7 agreement with Mexico that called for its authorities to take new steps to prevent migrants from entering the U. S. Mr. Trump has said Mexico has done “an outstanding job.”
The president’s new move reverses the U. S.’ s decades- old approach on asylum. It comes as the administration faces heavy criticism from Democrats and immigration rights groups over the treatment of children and other immigrants in detention facilities on the border.
The new policy is sure to attract legal challenges, as have many of the administration’s earlier plans to limit asylum. While the notice asserts that the policy complies with U. S. law, Lee Gelernt, deputy director of the Immigrants’ Rights Project of the
American Civil Liberties Union, said in a statement that it’s “patently unlawful and we will sue swiftly.”
“The Trump administration is trying to unilaterally reverse our country’s legal and moral commitment to protect those fleeing danger,” Mr. Gelernt said.
Sheila Velez- Martinez, director of the Immigration Law Clinic at the University of Pittsburgh, said the rule is certain to face legal challenge because U. S. law allows foreign nationals to seek asylum regardless of their route here.
Many asylum- seekers, including those advised by the law clinic, are coming from the so- called Northern Triangle countries of El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras because “their lives are at risk there.”
Both recent arrivals and those from past years report credible stories of gang violence, threats against their lives and weak government protection, she said.
“There are real and viable asylum claims, and those claims are not being heard” due to a backlog in cases, she said. “From the people we have been interviewing, there are many credible cases, but their turns have not yet come. Their stories are consistent with the stories we have heard from years ago. There’s no improvement in the situation.”
Monica Ruiz, executive director of Casa San Jose, a resource center for Hispanic immigrants, said the latest proposal is no surprise.
“It’s another tactic that this administration has taken in limiting the amount of immigrants that are in this country and taking away their possibilities to remain in this country,” she said.
She cited the administration’s sharp travel restrictions against several Muslim- majority nations and its efforts to revoke DACA, which delays removal of those brought illegally to the United States as children, and the temporary protected status that was granted to those from countries destabilized by disaster or conflict.
“All these policies are specifically targeting people of color,” she said. “That just goes along with the fact that this administration is blatantly racist.”
Ms. Ruiz said Mr. Trump is “using human beings as tokens, and I don’t want to live in a society where we’re using human beings as tokens.”
The Trump administration said there’s been a sharp increase in migrants claiming fear of persecution or torture when caught by U. S. authorities.
“Only a small minority of these individuals, however, are ultimately granted asylum,” according to the notice.
The U. S. granted asylum to 26,568 individuals in 2017, an increase of 31% from the year before, according to the Department of Homeland Security. The top countries from which those people came to the U. S. were China, El Salvador and Guatemala.
The rule allows for some exceptions. A claim can still be filed in the U. S. if a migrant’s application was denied in another country en route to the U. S. Also, applications would be allowed for victims of “a severe form of trafficking” and those who travel to the U. S. through countries that aren’t party to an international treaty on refugees.