Attorney General Trump's decision extends indefinite detention for asylum seekers

NEW YORK / SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – The US Attorney General on Tuesday rescinded a decision authorizing some asylum seekers to apply for bail before an immigration judge, which extends indefinite detention to some migrants. have to wait months or years for their cases to be heard.

The first immigration court decision issued by Donald Trump's new attorney general, William Barr, is in line with the administration's moves to curb the asylum process as tens of thousands of people, mainly from Central America, go to the United States to seek refuge. United States immigration courts are overseen by the Department of Justice and the Attorney General can rule in cases to establish a legal precedent.

Barr's decision is the latest example of the Trump administration that has adopted a tough line on immigration. This year, the administration has put in place a policy to return some asylum seekers to Mexico, while their cases are being examined by overwhelmed courts, a policy that has gone to trial.

Several top Homeland Security officials have been deported this month because of Trump's frustrations over the influx of migrants seeking refuge on the southern US border.

Barr's decision applies to migrants who have entered the United States illegally.

Generally, these migrants are placed in an "accelerated return" procedure – a faster form of expulsion for those who have entered the country illegally in the past two weeks and are detained within 160 km of the country. A land border. Migrants who come to the points of entry and ask for asylum can not be bonded.

But before Barr's decision, those who had crossed the border between two official points of entry and who had applied for asylum were eligible, once they had proved to asylum-seekers that they feared credible to be persecuted.

"I conclude that these aliens still can not be put on bail, that they arrive at the border or are apprehended in the United States," Barr said.

Barr added that these individuals could be detained until the end of their trial, or if the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) decided to release them by granting them "parole". DHS has the discretion to release parolees often because of insufficient space for detention or other humanitarian reasons.

Barr stated that he was delaying the 90-day effective date "so that DHS can proceed with the operational planning necessary to make further detention and parole decisions."

The impact of the decision is not yet clear, as it will depend largely on DHS's ability to increase the number of detentions, said Steve Vladeck, a law professor at the University of Texas.

"The number of asylum seekers who will remain in potentially unlimited detention pending resolution of their case will be almost entirely a question of DHS 'detention capacity, not whether the individual circumstances of each case justify the release or detention. detention, "said Vladeck.

DHS officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the decision. The agency had written in a memoir in the case that she claimed that eliminating the bail hearings of asylum seekers would have "an immediate and significant impact on … the operations of detention".

In early March, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the DHS agency in charge of illegally detaining and deporting immigrants to the country, said the average daily number of immigrants in detention was up. rose to 46,000 for the 2019 fiscal year, the highest level since the agency created in 2003. Last year, Reuters announced that ICE had modified a tool used by officers since 2013 to decide whether an immigrant should be detained or released on bail, which made the process more restrictive.

The decision will have no impact on unaccompanied migrant children, who are exempt from accelerated removal. Most families are also paroled because of the lack of facilities to reunite parents and children.

Michael Tan, of the American Civil Liberties Union, said the rights group was planning to sue the Trump government for its decision, and that immigrant rights defenders had decried the decision.

Barr's decision was made after former Attorney General Jeff Sessions decided to re-examine the case in October. The sessions resigned from his position in November, leaving the matter to Barr to decide.