TO CLOSE

Despite days of walking, sickness and uncertainty, Joel Eduardo Espinar, from Honduras, is determined to continue the difficult descent with his wife and children in a caravan of migrants from Mexico to the US border. . (November 2nd)
AP

Members of the Caravan of Central American migrants head to their next destination on November 4, 2018 in Isla, Mexico.(Photo: Spencer Platt, Getty Images)

WASHINGTON – The American Civil Liberties Union is seeking a court order to block President Donald Trump's new asylum restrictions, saying in a lawsuit filed on Friday that the policy violates federal immigration law.

"The new ban on asylum is totally illegal and risks sending many people back to danger," said Lee Gelernt, deputy director of the ACLU Immigrants & Rights project.

"Neither the President nor the Attorney General can override the immigration laws passed by Congress," Gelernt said. The ACLU, along with the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Center for Constitutional Rights, filed suit on behalf of several refugee and immigrant rights groups in federal court in Northern California on Friday.

The Trump administration said the president had acted with "clear legal authority" and denounced the lawsuit by defending the right of immigrants to enter the United States illegally.

"The President has the right to suspend the entry of foreigners he believes is in the national interest – and that's what President Trump did", said Friday evening the departments of justice and homeland security, in a joint statement.

Trump formalized politics Friday by signing a proclamation denying asylum to immigrants entering the United States illegally, rather than through an entry point – an action targeting a caravan of Central American migrants heading for US-Mexican border.

In its legal challenge, the ACLU claims that Trump's approach violates a 1965 law that states that any foreigner who arrives in the United States – "whether in a designated port of arrival" – may request l & # 39; asylum. In addition, the prosecution accuses the president of violating a 1946 law that defines how the executive can develop and enact regulations.

This administrative law allows courts to remove any action "arbitrary, capricious, abusive of discretion or otherwise not in accordance with the law" or contrary to constitutional rights.

"Since the horrors of the Second World War, nations around the world have committed to giving asylum seekers the opportunity to seek refuge," said Baher Azmy, legal director of the Center for Constitutional Rights. "The Trump administration can not challenge this extremely basic humanitarian project. principle, in violation of US law and international law, with a change of presidential pen. "

Under the new White House policy, illegally entered immigrants would be placed in accelerated expulsion proceedings instead of being able to gain access to the asylum procedure, the Federal Ministry of Justice announced on Thursday. of Internal Security in the Federal Register.

"Flood our country"

"They are flooding our country, we are not letting them in. But they are trying to flood our country," Trump said Friday after signing the proclamation.

Asylum is a form of protection granted to persons who fear being persecuted in their country of origin because of their race, religion, nationality, membership of a social group particular or their political views. From 2000 to 2016, the United States granted asylum to an average of 26,651 foreigners a year, according to data from the Department of Homeland Security.

Gelernt said that there were already long queues at legal entry points along the US-Mexico border, forcing desperate migrants to stay in extended limbo while there was no waiting for them. they sought to plead their cause to obtain asylum. Most migrants have already made difficult journeys to reach the US border.

Long waits at legal entry points have prompted some to attempt illegal crossings and seek asylum in this way. When the last caravan arrived in the United States in April 401, they showed up at the points of entry, as the administration urged them, but 122 illegally entered the country to request the arrival of the caravan. asylum, according to data provided by the US Citizenship and Immigration Services.

Trump and other White House officials have claimed that the country's asylum system is experiencing "endemic abuse", from 5,000 in 2008 to 97,000 in 2018, mainly because of locals from Central America fleeing violence and poverty in their home country.

"Our asylum system is overwhelmed by too many unfounded asylum applications from outsiders who place a tremendous burden on our resources, preventing us from being able to quickly grant asylum to those who are in need of asylum. really deserve it, "said Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen and her lawyer. General Matthew Whitaker said Thursday in a joint statement that he was planning Friday's proclamation.

On Friday, Trump accused the Democrats of blocking the reform that he said was needed to redress "obsolete" and "incompetent" immigration laws.

"These are the worst laws in force in all countries of the world, and that's only because we do not have the votes of the Democrats," he told reporters before leaving for a trip to Paris. "We need Democrat votes to be able to change immigration, and we will have no problem at the border."

Trump's restrictions "short-sighted"

Representative Eliot Engel, a New York Democrat who is about to become chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee at the next Congress, described Trump's asylum restrictions as "myopia". , including immigration.

"The president has a bad attitude with regard to immigration or the arrival of new people in this country. He is afraid of it," Engel said. "I do not know why, we are a country of immigrants," he added, noting that his own grandparents had immigrated to the United States 110 years ago.

Senator Bob Menendez, the largest Democrat on the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee, was more direct.

"The president's xenophobic efforts to exploit the suffering of desperate mothers and children seeking legal asylum clearly aim to distract from their own failures," said the New Democrat. Jersey.

Trump's policy would create "a bottleneck at entry points, effectively closing the door for vulnerable people seeking asylum," he added. "I refuse to stay tuned as this administration continues to systematically undermine asylum and refugee protection.

Friday's action follows several other measures taken by the administration to stop the caravan. The Pentagon has sent more than 7,000 army soldiers on active service to the border. And US Customs and Border Protection officials have repositioned agents from across the country to line up the southern border to prevent illegal entries.

During a visit to the border, CBP Commissioner Kevin McAleenan said that he considered the approaching caravan to be an "order keeping situation" and that his agents would not be able to not speed up the process to interview asylum seekers.

Officials from the Justice and Homeland Security ministries said they were negotiating with Mexico over the acceptance of expelled migrants. Mexico has already agreed to grant asylum to immigrants from Central America, mainly from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador.

US authorities say it's the place to go for persecution, but many migrants want to come to the United States.

More: President Trump denies asylum to immigrants from the US border entered outside entry points

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