The United States government is about to adopt a rule that will prevent migrants “not entered through regular points of entry” from claiming asylum.
The United States government has announced its intention to prevent migrants who have arrived on its territory unlawfully from filing an asylum claim. In practice, under the new rules, anyone who has not passed through an official crossing point at the American border – in particular the one with Mexico – will be unable to make any request.
"Our asylum system is buckling under the weight of too many unfounded claims. This demands a disproportionate effort from us and prevents us from instead rapidly granting documentation to those who are entitled to it," the United States Department of Homeland Security stated on 8 November. The proposal for a change to the rules came from that department, backed by President Donald Trump who, unsurprisingly, will in all likelihood sign the legislation shortly. It will represent an epochal and particularly significant change. Asylum, in fact, is a mechanism by which a state grants entry to its territory (or outside it at the premises of its foreign diplomatic missions – in which case the term "diplomatic asylum" is used) to refugees or persecuted persons.
The decision to press ahead on this point by the Washington administration may have been driven by the desire to stop the caravan made up of thousands of migrants that set off from Honduras and is illegally crossing Mexico with the aim of reaching the United States.
The American government states that asylum applications have grown by 2,000% over the past five years and that only one in ten is accepted. But beyond the figures, the new migration "clampdown" is likely to trigger a legal battle, as was the case with the 2017 decision to block citizens of certain nations from entering United States territory (the well-known "Muslim ban").
In that case, the decree signed by Donald Trump was upheld by the Supreme Court only after numerous legal actions. It is likely that the fate of the new legislation may also be decided in a courtroom. For its part, the organisation that defends civil liberties in the United States, the Aclu, is already on a war footing: "American law specifically authorises every individual to seek asylum, regardless of the route used to arrive on the territory. Circumventing this principle is illegal," Omar Jadwat, a director of the organisation, stated in a press release. "The government cannot abandon to their own fate those who are fleeing a situation of danger," added the New York Immigration Coalition, a group that defends migrants' rights.
