White House to contest ‘Remain in Mexico’ ruling
WASHINGTON — The Biden administration plans to challenge a federal judge’s ruling that the government reinstate a controversial Trump administration program that required asylumseekers to wait in Mexico for decisions in their U.S. immigration cases.
The government filed notice Monday that it would appeal the ruling to the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals, the appeals court that covers Texas, where the federal judge ruled against the administration Friday. The judge paused the effect of his ruling for seven days to give the federal government a chance to appeal.
In an opinion in a case brought by Texas and Missouri, U.S. District Judge Matthew J. Kacsmaryk of the Northern District of Texas found that Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas hadn’t offered sufficient rationale to end the socalled Remain in Mexico program in violation of administrative law.
The judge, a Trump appointee, ordered the administration to implement the policy “in good faith” until it can rescind it in accordance with administrative law, and until
the government has capacity to detain migrants crossing the border without authorization “without releasing any aliens because of a lack of detention resources.”
The judge’s ruling “would force the government to return
to an illegal policy that places asylum seekers in danger and deprives them of their rights to protection under both domestic and international law,” said Judy Rabinovitz of the American Civil Liberties Union, the lead attorney in litigation challenging the immigration program during the Trump administration. She said the Biden administration “properly exercised its authority to end the policy.”
Jessica Bolter, an associate policy analyst at the Migration Policy Institute, predicted that if the administration
loses on appeal, it would try to rescind the immigration program again in a way that meets administrative law requirements. In the meantime, the administration could also re-implement the policy “extremely sparingly,” so that few migrants would be forced back to Mexico.
Judge Kacsmaryk said Mr. Mayorkas “failed to consider several of the main benefits” of the Trump immigration policy. The policy has been panned by humanitarian advocates, but the judge noted the program had deterred migrants from seeking asylum.