President Biden’s attempt to curtail asylum processing at the southern border seems to only have resulted in a decrease in the number of immigrants entering the United States, according to official data. Using a sweeping executive authority, Biden issued a directive to discourage migrants from seeking U.S. asylum, making deportation of migrants unlawfully in the country a smoother process. Statistics indicate an amplified retreat in unauthorized border crossings following this order. Alarmingly, in July, the number of migrants illicitly crossing the southern border hit a nearly four-year record low of 56,400, as reported by federal agencies.
As per U.S. officials, this sharp dip was influenced not just by rising summer temperatures, but also by Biden’s restrictive measures and the Mexican government’s crackdown on north-trekking migrants. The Biden administration’s severe curb on asylum-seeking—an unprecedented move by any Democratic president—has ushered in consequential alterations in the way migrants are handled at the U.S.-Mexico border.
One such drastic change has been the remarkable fall in numbers of migrants being released by the Border Patrol. Previously perceived as an incentive for migration, the previous dispensation of summons to appear in immigration court would often lead to migrants staying in the U.S. for years on end, sometimes regardless of the validity of their asylum claims. The argument being, of course, that the burdened immigration court system is swamped with millions of pending cases.
Astoundingly, the Border Patrol released a mere 12,000 migrants in July compared to 28,000 in June and an astonishing high of 62,000 back in May, all before Biden’s asylum modifications. A drastic drop in migrant release in December 2023 is also noteworthy when, during a high tide of migration, the Border Patrol released 192,000 migrants carrying court notices.
A corresponding sharp rise in the number of migrants entering ‘expedited removal’ proceedings stood concurrent with the decrease in releases under Biden’s reign. Expedited removal proceedings are notable in that they enable officials to promptly deport recent border crossers who either do not claim asylum, fail asylum interviews, or similarly find themselves not making the cut.
Before Biden imposed strict asylum restrictions, merely a quarter or less of all migrants apprehended by Border Patrol were engaged in expedited removal proceedings due to lack of resources. However, in July, approximately 50% or 28,000 of 56,000 once-apprehended migrants underwent expedited removal procedures, a stark jump from just 43% in June and 25% in May.
According to the Department of Homeland Security, over 100,000 migrants have been ejected or sent back to Mexico or their own countries since Biden’s dubious partial asylum ban. Unfortunately, the onus of asylum—intended to protect foreigners seeking refuge from persecution based on political views, religion, or social grouping—can mistakenly be neglected. Poverty, for example, is not recognised as a ground for seeking asylum, a debatable view held by some.
Migrants in expedited removal proceedings who claim fear of persecution if deported must undergo a ‘credible fear’ screening with an asylum officer. While this seems fair on the surface, the numbers show a different reality. Migrants who clear these interviews are allowed to seek asylum before an immigration judge. However, those who fail these interviews face immediate deportation, a dichotomy that places severe pressure on migrants and allows room for selectivity based on subjective circumstances.
Following Biden’s partial ban on asylum, the number of migrant screenings by U.S. asylum officers has decreased significantly, pointing towards stricter eligibility criteria. Furthermore, apart from making most migrants ineligible for asylum, the rules enacted in June introduced a critical change that allowed immigration officials to bypass asking migrants about their fear of harm before deportation—a critical question in the old protocol.
This revised process now only applies to migrants who express fear of harm proactively, hence they are the only ones referred to the asylum screenings. Post this shift, the percentage of migrants under expedited removal processes recorded as afraid of persecution dropped to 24%, a number far smaller than the 55% average before Biden’s restrictive action.
Alarming figures point towards a plummet in the quantity of referrals to screen migrants landing on U.S. asylum officers’ tables; this number dropped from 20,000 referrals per month to 1,900 in July. Even for migrants fortunate enough to receive an interview, passing became harder as screenings were made more stringent, often only permitting forms of humanitarian protection that do not pave a path to permanent legal status.
Biden’s asylum order surprisingly encompasses certain exemptions. For instance, it does not pertain to unaccompanied minors or migrants securing an appointment to be processed via a phone application at an official entry point. In July, over 38,000 such app-based migrants were processed, yet the vetting process remains obscure beyond the practical convenience.
The controversial Biden initiative commits to cessation once the seven-day average of daily illegal crossings reduces to 1,500. While the numbers are close to this threshold, August figures demonstrate a plateau rather than a much-needed decreasing trajectory, raising questions about the effectiveness of this summers’s cracking down on the asylum-seeking process.
Biden’s executive action is also facing legal challenges. The American Civil Liberties Union, among other immigrant rights organizations, has contested the rule in court, calling it a replication of rejected Trump-era policies. While the results of these legal battles are yet undecided, this does highlight the potential non-compliance of these decisions with U.S. asylum law.
Despite the controversy, Biden’s crackdown has found some surprising political support. Texas, a state known for its legal resistance towards almost all major Biden migration policies, has sided with Biden’s asylum directive, even going as far as to intervene in the ACLU case labeling Biden’s action as ‘reasonable’. On its part, the White House has credited Biden’s ‘decisive actions’ for the reduced migrant crossings, prompting a wave of criticism from migrant rights advocates.
Biden’s Unfair Crack Down on Asylum Seeking Migrants Slashes Numbers appeared first on Real News Now.
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