US could block asylum on public health grounds under Trump regulation
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Crosses and protest banners depicting US President Donald Trump hanging on the Mexico side of the Mexico–US border wall.
PHOTO: AFP
Follow topic:
- US can deny asylum at the border based on public health concerns, using a Trump-era regulation effective December 31.
- Title 42 was used during Covid-19 to expel migrants, and critics fear the new rule will be overused.
- Biden administration postponed the rule's start multiple times but didn't end it; it also impacts "withholding of removal".
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WASHINGTON – The US could deny migrants at the US-Mexico border access to asylum under a newly finalised regulation first drafted during the Covid-19 pandemic in President Donald Trump’s first term.
The regulation, which goes into effect on Dec 31, allows the US authorities to bar asylum based on “emergency public health concerns generated by a communicable disease”, according to a copy posted in the Federal Register on Dec 29.
The restrictions would not have any immediate effect but would provide the Trump administration with another tool to turn away would-be asylum seekers at the US-Mexico border.
The number of migrants caught crossing illegally dropped to the lowest levels in decades after Mr Trump took office in January and implemented a sweeping asylum ban at the border.
When Covid-19 took root in 2020 during Mr Trump’s first term, his administration used a US health authority known as Title 42 to rapidly expel migrants crossing the border back to Mexico, saying it was needed to limit the spread of the virus.
Former president Joe Biden, a Democrat who followed Mr Trump in 2021, kept the Title 42 restrictions in place until 2023, partly due to legal challenges that stalled attempts to end them.
Advocates have criticised the use of health emergencies to broadly deny access to asylum, saying US law has been twisted to fulfil Mr Trump’s goal of turning away migrants.
“Considering the large amount of discretion the regulation grants the administration, and the President’s hyperfixation on immigration enforcement, we can expect this new authority to be overused and abused,” said Ms Sarah Pierce, director of social policy at the centre-left group Third Way.
The Biden administration postponed the effective date of the regulation five times, but did not take steps to terminate it.
In addition to asylum, the measure also allows federal agencies to deny another form of protection known as “withholding of removal”. REUTERS
