Cartoon by Dario Castillejos

The Trump Administration’s Plan to Effectively End Asylum Is Almost Certainly Illegal

Vox: Tens of thousands of asylum-seekers have set up encampments in cities along the U.S.-Mexico border, where they’ve been forced to wait for weeks before they can formally enter the United States to plead asylum. But now, many of them won’t be able to try at all.

The Trump administration implemented a new rule Tuesday that will effectively end asylum protections for the hundreds of thousands of migrants who pass through another country on their way to the U.S. Migrants will now be required to apply for — and be denied — asylum protections in another country before they can apply for relief in the U.S.
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Administration officials have framed the rule, which has reportedly been in the works for months, as a way of disincentivizing “meritless” asylum claims and alleviating the growing backlog of immigration cases. But experts and immigration advocates say the rule is illegal because it violates the asylum protocols issued by Congress. The American Civil Liberties Union has already threatened to “sue swiftly” to prevent the rule from going into effect.

Under the Immigration and Nationality Act, migrants can be denied asylum if they were “firmly resettled” in another country before arriving in the U.S. And migrants who pass through a “safe third country” can already be denied asylum in the U.S. if they didn’t apply in the other country first. A “safe third country” is one that has agreed to a treaty with the U.S. to process asylum seekers who arrive there first. Canada is the only country that has agreed to this status.

But the Trump administration’s new rule takes that policy a step further: Migrants will now be denied asylum if they pass through any other country, even ones that haven’t agreed to safe third country status, on their way to the U.S.

“No one could credibly argue that it is safe for asylum-seekers in Mexico or in Guatemala,” said Tom Jawetz, vice president of immigration policy at the Center for American Progress. “Moreover, there is no way in which you could argue that simply transiting through a country would constitute being ‘firmly resettled.’”

In effect, the new rule will forbid almost all migrants who arrive at the southern border from applying for asylum protections, with a few exceptions. Migrants who applied for (and were denied) asylum elsewhere can still apply. So can victims of human trafficking. The “credible fear” interview — the first step in applying for asylum — will only be given to migrants who meet these exceptions.

People who fly to the U.S. and plead for asylum in airports won’t be affected by the new rule — but most foreign citizens need visas to travel to the U.S., which most asylum-seekers wouldn’t qualify for anyway >>>