(CNN) — President Joe Biden is taking inspiration from former President Donald Trump’s immigration playbook to try to stem the flow of asylum seekers from around the world crossing the U.S. border with Mexico.
Biden’s new plan, presented Tuesday at the White House, which aims to practically close the US border to asylum seekers who cross it illegally, makes use of the executive authority that Trump once used to prohibit entry into the United States of people from predominantly Muslim countries in 2017 and also to ban entry for most asylum seekers in 2018, days after Republicans suffered huge setbacks in that year’s midterm elections.
It’s a strange, election-year twist, since Biden actually launched his 2020 campaign in part on a promise to reverse those actions, which he did in the months after taking office. Trump’s asylum policy was also blocked by federal courts before Biden overturned it.
In addition to stemming the flow of asylum seekers, Biden’s action could have the political effect of cutting Trump’s lead on immigration and triangulating some middle ground support, even if it leaves progressives upset.
Trump and Biden are very far from each other
Trump and Biden’s rhetoric on immigrants remains very different. Biden is open to immigrants as an important segment of American society. He wants to protect the children of undocumented immigrants who have grown up in the U.S. and create a path to citizenship for those already here.
Trump routinely uses exaggerated rhetoric to demonize immigrants and asylum seekers, calling them criminals or part of a coordinated invasion of the United States, although there is no evidence to support these claims. Trump has promised a militaristic approach to the border and a mass deportation program if he is elected in November.
Former President Donald Trump visits the US-Mexico border in Eagle Pass, Texas, as seen from Piedras Negras, Mexico, on February 29. Credit: Go Nakamura/Reuters
Biden, for his part, has been pivoting toward the center on immigration all year. The decision to invoke executive authority comes months after a bipartisan border proposal in Congress failed to result in a new permanent law to reform the asylum process. Republican lawmakers, deferring to Trump, refused to cooperate with the White House. Trump had said that he wanted to present himself on the issue of immigration in this election year.
Announcing the new measure at the White House, Biden said he was trying to “do what congressional Republicans refused to do.”
Although he is adopting the authority behind Trump’s policy, he promised not to adopt his rhetoric.
“I will never refer to immigrants as poisoning the blood of a country,” Biden said at the White House.
Biden argued that the exceptions to his measure make it more humane than Trump’s proposals. Asylum seekers can still try to make an appointment with border officials and apply for asylum at a port of entry.
Challenges ahead
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which challenged Trump’s border actions when he was president, now plans to challenge Biden.
“It was illegal when Trump did it, and it’s no less illegal now,” Lee Gelernt, deputy director of the ACLU’s Immigrant Rights Project, said in a statement.
But today’s Supreme Court, which has a majority of conservative appointees, might be friendlier to Biden’s move.
Border crossings have decreased
CNN’s Rosa Flores reported from Hidalgo, Texas, on Tuesday and noted the decline in crossings. While there were around 250,000 border apprehensions last December, numbers for recent months are less than 140,000, and Flores reported that numbers dropped even further in May.
Biden’s plan would prohibit immigrants who cross the border illegally from seeking asylum once they reach a daily threshold, with some exceptions. The measure would remain in place until meetings fell below an average of 1,500 a day.
A drone shows the border wall between the United States and Mexico in Jacumba Hot Springs, California, on June 3. Credit: Go Nakamura/Reuters
Hidalgo County officials told Flores that any measures to address the influx of asylum seekers would have to take into account the cross-border traffic that generates economic activity in the area.
A top Hidalgo County official, Judge Richard Cortez, told Flores that Biden’s action, while welcome, was a “patch” and not a permanent solution.
“Comprehensive immigration reform remains the only solution and Congress remains the only place to achieve this reform,” Cortez said in a statement to Flores.
Flores described her interviews with women who were victims of sexual violence while waiting on the Mexican side of the border for asylum applications to be processed and noted the vulnerable position that today’s measure could force migrants into if they wait in the Mexican side of the border.
Because right now?
CNN’s Priscilla Alvarez, reporting from the White House, said part of the Biden administration’s calculation had been to wait until after Mexico’s presidential election, which occurred over the weekend, to announce this new action. Americans’ ability to reduce border crossings will depend, she said, in part on Mexico’s ability to stem the flow of asylum seekers within its borders.
“We continue to work closely with our Mexican neighbors instead of attacking Mexico,” Biden said at the White House, drawing a distinction between his approach and Trump’s. Biden said he spoke with Mexico’s president-elect on Monday.
Trump has an advantage on immigration
CNN’s Harry Enten notes that in the years since the Covid-19 pandemic, immigration has become increasingly important in voters’ minds.
What is worrying for Biden is that Trump is favored by 27 percentage points on this issue, according to a CNBC poll.
Long standing authority
Presidents have been using the authority to act at the border for decades; It is based on an immigration law from the 1950s. The text is as follows:
“Whenever the President considers that the entry of any alien or any class of alien into the United States would be detrimental to the interests of the United States, he may, by proclamation and for such period as he deems necessary, suspend the entry of all aliens or of any class of foreigners as immigrants or non-immigrants, or impose any restrictions on the entry of foreigners that it deems appropriate”.
According to the Congressional Research Service, all recent presidents have used this authority to restrict the entry into the US of specific groups of people, such as Europeans during the Covid-19 pandemic, suspected terrorists or officials of countries like Iran.
A fact sheet released by the Department of Homeland Security outlines specific changes to how noncitizens will be processed at the border. Detainees to whom accelerated expulsion is applied must express their fear of returning to their country of origin in order to be interviewed about their situation. Otherwise, they will be quickly returned to Mexico or their country of origin.
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