Zolan Kanno-Youngs and Miriam Jordan

Judge Timothy J. Kelly of the U.S. District Court in Washington declined to issue a temporary restraining order that would have blocked the government from effectively banning asylum for most Central American migrants, who have been arriving in record numbers this year.

The rule, now being applied on a limited basis in Texas, requires migrants to seek asylum in the first safe country they arrive in — in most of the current cases, Mexico.

“I do not find on this limited record the plaintiffs have provided sufficient evidence of a certain great and immediate harm to meet this high burden,” Kelly said Wednesday.

Under the policy, which the administration announced July 15, only immigrants who had officially lost their bids for asylum in another country through which they traveled or who had been victims of “severe” human trafficking are permitted to apply for asylum in the United States.

Hondurans and Salvadorans have to apply for asylum and be denied in Guatemala or Mexico before they became eligible to apply in the United States, and Guatemalans have to apply and be denied in Mexico. The policy reversed long-standing asylum laws that ensure people can seek safe haven no matter where they come from. On July 16, the day the new rule went into effect — initially in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas — the American Civil Liberties Union challenged the policy in court in San Francisco. The case under review Wednesday in Washington was filed separately by two advocacy organizations, the Capital Area Immigrants’ Rights Coalition and Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services.

The groups had asked the court to find that Congress did not intend that mere transit through another country would render an applicant ineligible for asylum in the United States, and to rule that the policy did not comply with required procedural steps. Kelly, however, disputed the plaintiffs’ contention that Attorney General William Barr overstepped legal requirements when issuing the rule.

“I think at this point, the plaintiffs are reading too strictly a limitation on the attorney general’s authority,” Kelly said.

He also found that the two advocacy organizations did not provide sufficient support for the contention that there would be “irreparable harm” to the plaintiffs in the case if an immediate, temporary block to the policy were not imposed. While the rule would impact migrants seeking asylum, “The plaintiffs before me here are not asylum-seekers,” the judge said.

“They are only two organizations, one of which operates in the D.C. area, far from the southern border,” he said.

Claudia Cubas, the Capital Area Immigrants’ Rights Coalition’s litigation director, said the organization was disappointed in the decision. “This new rule is contrary to our laws, and we will continue to challenge this attempt to remove asylum eligibly from those who are fleeing violence and persecution around the world,” Cubas said in a statement.

In recent years, the number of migrants petitioning through the asylum process has sharply increased.

In record numbers, migrant families and unaccompanied children have been turning themselves in to Border Patrol agents and requesting asylum, which typically enables them to remain in the United States for years as their cases wind through the backlogged immigration courts. Only about 20% of them ultimately win asylum, according to the government, and many of those whose applications are rejected remain in the country unlawfully.

The majority of the 688,375 migrants who were encountered at the border since the beginning of the fiscal year that began in October have come from Central America. Kelly did seem to concur with the administration’s contention that there was a need to contain migration numbers at the border.

“The records suggest our immigration system at the border has been severely strained and that such an increase, if it occurred, would at minimum have negative repercussions,” the judge said.

The administration announced the new asylum policy despite the fact that Guatemala and Mexico had not agreed to the plan, which means those countries have made no assurances that they would grant asylum to migrants who were intending to go to the United States.

The Trump administration has been negotiating for months with Guatemala and Mexico in the hope of reducing the number of asylum-seekers showing up at the nation’s southern border. Talks with Guatemala broke down and the country’s president, Jimmy Morales, backed out of a meeting that had been scheduled for July 15 at the White House. Talks with Mexico remain in flux.

In November, President Donald Trump unveiled a separate policy that banned migrants from applying for asylum if they failed to make the request at a legal checkpoint. Only those who entered the country through a port of entry would be eligible, not those who entered illegally between ports, even if they turned themselves in.

Judge Jon S. Tigar of the U.S. District Court in San Francisco, who is also hearing the second case on the new asylum rule, issued a temporary restraining order blocking the implementation of that policy. The case is currently on appeal in the 9th Circuit. The government sought to stay the federal court’s ruling pending resolution of the case, but the Supreme Court, in a 5-4 ruling, declined to reinstate the policy.

That case resulted in an unusual public disagreement between Trump and Chief Justice John Roberts after Trump called the liberal-leaning 9th Circuit a “disgrace” and labeled Tigar an “Obama judge.” Like the earlier rule, the latest rule was intended to deter Central Americans from heading to the United States.

But the government has found other ways to curb the entry of migrants. At ports of entry, Customs and Border Protection agents have significantly slowed the processing of applicants by way of a system called metering, limiting how many migrants are processed in a day to as few as a dozen. In addition, the courts have allowed the Department of Homeland Security to begin ordering asylum-seekers to wait in Mexico until the day of their court hearing, undermining their chances of winning asylum by making it more difficult for them to secure a lawyer to represent them in the United States. Some 16,000 migrants are now waiting in Mexican border towns like Tijuana under the program, which is officially known as Migration Protection Protocols but is more commonly referred to as “Remain in Mexico.”

So far, the administration’s efforts have largely failed to halt the wave of migrants. In May, more than 144,000 crossed the border, mainly from Central America. There was a 28% drop in June, the first decline of the year, which may have been partly a result of the normal slowing of migration in the dangerous summer heat.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/24/us/asylum-ruling-tro.html" id="a2072c6d-d7d5-3119-abe5-9af20700ebd7">The New York Times</a>.

Court Declines to Block New Trump Administration Rule Barring Most Asylum Petitions

WASHINGTON — A federal judge Wednesday let stand a new rule that bars migrants who failed to apply for asylum in at least one country on their way to the southwest border from obtaining protections in the United States, dealing the Trump administration a temporary win.

The groups had asked the court to find that Congress did not intend that mere transit through another country would render an applicant ineligible for asylum in the United States, and to rule that the policy did not comply with required procedural steps.

The majority of the 688,375 migrants who were encountered at the border since the beginning of the fiscal year that began in October have come from Central America.

Judge Jon S. Tigar of the U.S. District Court in San Francisco issued a temporary restraining order blocking the implementation of that policy. The case is currently on appeal in the 9th Circuit. The government sought to stay the federal court’s ruling pending resolution of the case, but the Supreme Court, in a 5-4 ruling, declined to reinstate the policy.

<h1>WASHINGTON — The acting director of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency said Wednesday that he would follow through with plans to send agents into communities to round up and deport families in the U.S. illegally, in the Trump administration’s latest attempt to deter large-scale migration of Central Americans to the southwest border.</h1>

The acting director, Mark Morgan, who has signaled for weeks that there would be a heightened focus on deporting families, told reporters that agents would target more than 2,000 immigrant family members who already have deportation orders.

“Do not come,” Morgan said in describing the message he wants to send to people from Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador who think they will be able to remain in the United States once they get across the border. “Do not risk it. Do not pay the cartels an exorbitant amount of money because once you receive due process and get a final order, you will be removed.”

Morgan’s comments came after President Donald Trump tweeted Monday that the immigration agency would deport millions of people next week. The president’s tweet alarmed immigrant communities and blindsided immigration agents across the country who described such a massive operation as logistically impossible.

The agency has, however, taken steps in recent days to prepare for mass arrests, including requesting the help of Homeland Security investigative agents, who usually conduct long-term investigations into trafficking organizations as opposed to deportations.

“I don’t want to send ICE agents to their workplace,” Morgan said. “I don’t want to send ICE agents to their home. I don’t want to send ICE agents to try and track them down and apprehend them in their communities and town. But we’ve applied due process. We’ve tried to work with them.”

The targeted operation is expected to occur over the course of multiple days and is expected in the coming weeks, according to a Homeland Security Department official who was not authorized to speak specifically about the operation. Morgan did not reveal the full scope of the operation but said that agents would be rounding up undocumented immigrant families if they failed to report to an immigration agency field office for deportation.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/19/us/politics/trump-immigration-deportation-family-separation.html" target="_blank">The New York Times</a>.

Immigration Agency Says It Plans Deportation Operation Aimed at Undocumented Families

The acting director, Mark Morgan, who has signaled for weeks that there would be a heightened focus on deporting families, told reporters that agents would target more than 2,000 immigrant family members who already have deportation orders.

Immigration agency says it plans deportation operation aimed at undocumented families

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Zolan Kanno-Youngs and Miriam Jordan

Articles written by the author

Court Declines to Block New Trump Administration Rule Barring Most Asylum Petitions

Court Declines to Block New Trump Administration Rule Barring Most Asylum Petitions

Court Declines to Block New Trump Administration Rule Barring Most Asylum Petitions

Immigration agency says it plans deportation operation aimed at undocumented families