By Elliot Spagat - The Associated Press
A federal judge ruled Thursday that the US government's practice of denying immigrants the opportunity to seek asylum at the Mexican border until there is room to process the petitions is unconstitutional.
The ruling of the federal district magistrate Cynthia Bashant does not have an immediate impact, but it could prevent the government from limiting the entry of asylum seekers on the grounds that it lacks resources.
It could also give relief to some of the tens of thousands of people who put their names on unofficial waiting lists
in Mexican border cities.
[The Government presents its new asylum application system to approve (and reject) immigrants at the border faster]
Bashant, who was elected by former President Barack Obama, ordered the Justice Department and the plaintiffs, led by the Los Angeles activist group Al Otro Lado, to recommend their next steps before October 1.
The practice of limiting the number of people who can request asylum at land crossings between the United States and Mexico, known as
metering
, began in 2016 during the Obama presidency, when large numbers of Haitians showed up at the main crossing to San Diego. from Tijuana, Mexico.
It was expanded to the entire border in 2018 with Donald Trump in the White House, generating often dubious waiting lists that varied considerably between Mexican border cities.
The United States stopped accepting asylum applications at the crossings in March 2020, with few exceptions, due to an order related to the pandemic known as Title 42. At the time, the Trump Administration invoked its authority to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, and Joe Biden's executive expanded it.
In her decision, the magistrate asked both parties to explain the impact of Title 42
.
Asylum seekers in Tijuana, Mexico hear names being announced from a waiting list to apply for asylum at a border crossing in San Diego on September 26, 2019.AP Photo / Elliot Spagat
The waiting lists continue to grow.
In May, those in Mexican border cities had more than 18,600 names, more than half of them in Tijuana, according to a report by the Robert Strauss Center for International Security and Law at the University of Texas at Austin.
The records broke their record with nearly 27,000 names in August 2019.
In her 45-page ruling, the judge found that the practice violated constitutional rights to due process under the law and a federal law that requires officials to prosecute anyone who comes forward seeking asylum.
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The magistrate, responding to a lawsuit filed almost four years ago, unequivocally backed the criticism that waiting lists were not monitored by US authorities, that they are subject to fraud and corruption, and that asylum seekers were exposed to serious physical dangers while waiting in Mexico.
Those who sued the US government felt vindicated.
[I was granted asylum and voluntarily left the US 30 years ago. Do I have a chance to return?]
"The Court duly recognized the high human cost of
metering
, including the high risk of assault, disappearance and death when Customs and Border Protection agents fail to perform their duty to inspect and process asylum seekers and force them to wait in Mexico, "said Melissa Crow, an attorney with the Southern Poverty Law Center.
The Justice Department declined to comment.
President Biden called metering a "disastrous" practice during his election campaign, but it is unclear whether he holds that view or whether the courts could force him to adopt it anyway.
Last week, the Supreme Court ordered the government to reinstate Trump's "Remain in Mexico" policy so that asylum seekers who have entered US soil and have a date to appear before an immigration judge wait in Mexico for this to happen.