The Trump administration filed a regulation on Monday to try and curb the number of Central American migrants who can claim asylum by entering the United States through Mexico on Monday, according to PBS NewsHour.
A document filed by the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security in the Federal Register detailed the regulation which aims to decrease access to the asylum process and could affect a large number of migrants who make a perilous journey from their home countries in Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras through Mexico to reach the U.S. border.
The regulation would prohibit migrants who have resided in a third country from seeking asylum in the U.S., which would essentially bar migrants from traveling through Mexico and would drastically limit who is eligible for claiming asylum.
"Pursuant to statutory authority, the Departments are amending their respective regulations to provide that, with limited exceptions, an alien who enters or attempts to enter the United States across the southern border after failing to apply for protection in a third country outside the alien's country of citizenship, nationality, or last lawful habitual residence through which the alien transited en route to the United States is ineligible for asylum," the document said.
The rule is scheduled to publish Tuesday and should go into effect then.
Attorney General William Barr defended the regulation in a statement released on Monday.
“This Rule is a lawful exercise of authority provided by Congress to restrict eligibility for asylum," Barr said. “The United States is a generous country but is being completely overwhelmed by the burdens associated with apprehending and processing hundreds of thousands of aliens along the southern border.
“This Rule will decrease forum shopping by economic migrants and those who seek to exploit our asylum system to obtain entry to the United States - while ensuring that no-one is removed from the United Staes who is more likely that not to be tortured or persecuted on account of a protected ground.”
There are some exceptions to the rule, including if someone has been trafficked, if the country the migrant passed through did not sign one of the major international treaties which govern how refugees are managed, or if the asylum-seeker sought protection in a country but was denied, then they can still apply for asylum within the U.S.
The policy will likely face immense legal challenges since U.S. law already allows refugees and migrants to request asylum when arriving at the U.S. border, no matter how they arrived there.
The Trump administration has already tried to implement a wide number of immigration controls, with many having been blocked by the courts, including an attempt to deny asylum to anyone crossing the border illegally.
The immigration system has been overwhelmed under the Trump administration's "zero tolerance" policies since tens of thousands of migrant families continue to cross the border each month to claim asylum.
Border facilities have become overcrowded and are beyond their intended capacity and a report issued by the Department of Homeland Security’s watchdog said the conditions were fetid and filthy for many of the migrant children in the system.
-WN.com, Maureen Foody
Photo:
AP / Jon Elswick
