US asylum seekers arriving at the US-Mexico border will again be forced to wait in Mexico until their asylum claims are processed.
Last January, Joe Biden ‘s administration decided to end his predecessor’s policy of forcing asylum seekers to stay in Mexico while waiting for a judge to rule on their applications. Governors in Republican-controlled states have taken legal action against Joe Biden’s decision. After hearing the parties, the Supreme Court, mostly made up of conservative judges, had decided in favor of the Republicans.
This policy will be reinstated next week according to the online media AXIOS quoted by the online agency INDEPENDENT.
“In accordance with the court order, we are working to restore the MPP as soon as possible,” said Marsha Espinosa, one of the spokespersons for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). However, Ms. Espinosa recalls that the government cannot “… do it until [it] has obtained the independent agreement of the government of Mexico to accept those we seek to enroll in the MPP. We will communicate to the court and to the public the timing of the re-implementation when we are ready to do so ”.
Several immigrant rights advocates in the United States had called the policy racist. For the American Civil Liberties Union “this policy is illegal and unspeakably cruel. The people who were sent to Mexico have consistently been subjected to horrific crime and exploitation, including kidnappings, rapes and other violent attacks, ”the ACLU said on its website.
To justify the implementation of this policy, immigration officials under the administration of Donald Trump had put forward “the high rate of immigrants not having filed for asylum and / or disappeared before an immigration judge can determine the merits of their request ”.
Head of DHS under the reign of Donald Trump, Kirstjen Nielsen explained that “We have implemented unprecedented action that will respond to the urgent humanitarian and security crisis on the southern border. This humanitarian approach will help put an end to the exploitation of our generous immigration laws, ”calling the policy a“ common sense methodical approach ”.
During his election campaign, candidate Joe Biden promised to reform the American migration system by regularizing the situation of millions undocumented immigrants in the United States. A promise that he struggles to keep due to the fragile majority held by the Democrats in the two branches of congres.