US supreme court to decide on Trump’s ‘Remain in Mexico’ asylum policy

The US supreme court on Monday agreed to decide the legality of one of Donald Trump’s hardline immigration policies that has forced tens of thousands to wait in Mexico rather than entering the US, while their asylum claims are processed.

More than 60,000 asylum seekers were returned under the “Remain in Mexico” program. In late February, the US justice department estimated that 25,000 were still waiting in Mexico for hearings in US court. Those hearings were suspended because of the coronavirus pandemic.

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Migrants, many of them children, have faced violence and homelessness while awaiting court dates. Human rights groups have documented cases of kidnappings, rapes and assaults.

Immigration advocacy groups and 11 individual asylum seekers who fled violence in El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras and were returned to Mexico after entering the US filed suit to challenge the legality of the policy.

In a statement on Monday, Judy Rabinovitz, an attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union, which is challenging the policy, called the policy “illegal and depraved”.

“The courts have repeatedly ruled against it, and the supreme court should as well,” she said.

As is typical, the court did not comment in announcing it would hear the case. Because the court’s calendar is full through the end of the year, the justices will not hear the case until 2021. If Joe Biden were to win the presidential election on 3 November and rescind the policy, the case would become largely moot.

The case concerns a Trump administration appeal against a 2019 lower-court ruling that found the policy probably violated federal immigration law. The program, officially called Migrant Protection Protocols, remains in effect because the supreme court in March put the lower court’s decision to block the policy on hold.

Trump has said “Remain in Mexico”, which took effect in January 2019, has reduced the flow of migrants from Central America. Restricting both illegal and legal immigration has been a central theme of Trump’s presidency. He has sought to reduce asylum claims through a series of policy and rule changes.

The policy represented a fundamental change to previous US practice. The Trump administration has said allowing thousands of asylum seekers across the border would swamp the US immigration system and damage relations with Mexico.

A federal judge blocked the program nationwide, saying forcing asylum applicants to wait in Mexico was contrary to the text of the Immigration and Nationality Act and violated treaty-based obligations to not send refugees back to dangerous countries.

In February, the San Francisco-based ninth US circuit court of appeals partially upheld that ruling. The supreme court then put the injunction on hold.