Asylum
Asylum grants legal protection to foreign nationals already in the U.S. or arriving at the border who can’t go back to their home country because of persecution. Learn more about the asylum system in the United States, including how asylum is defined, eligibility requirements, and the difficult and complex application process.
Trump Labels Asylum Seekers as National Security Threat in Expanded Asylum Bar
Even as President Trump downplays the threat of COVID-19, the Trump administration is using the pandemic as a pretext to bar more people from asylum in the United States. While the proposal is being tied to the coronavirus right now, this asylum bar could remain in place long after… Read More
Trump Administration Plans Unnecessary and Unconscionable Ban on Asylum Seekers Masked Behind False Public Health Premise
The Trump Administration announced a soon-to-be-published proposed rule that would allow the Department of Homeland Security to ban people from seeking asylum in the United States solely because they traveled from or through a country under threat by a serious disease. For the first time, the Trump administration would also ban “withholding of removal,” a related form of protection that the Department of Justice has previously agreed in court it cannot eliminate without violating international law. Read More
Federal Court Strikes Down Trump’s Asylum Transit Ban in Momentous Victory
On June 30, a federal judge in the District of Columbia struck down the Trump administration’s asylum transit ban, ending a sweeping policy that had shut down asylum for most people entering the United States at the southern border. The court’s decisive action could not have come soon enough,… Read More
DHS Suggests Asylum Seekers Should Get Used to ‘Homelessness’ After Stripping Work Permits
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) will finalize a new regulation on June 26 which will strip most asylum seekers of the right to seek work authorization. The rule imposes sweeping new grounds to deny asylum seekers a work permit during the multi-year process of obtaining asylum. DHS dismissed… Read More
What You Need to Know About Trump’s Proposal to Eliminate the US Asylum System
In sweeping new proposed regulations announced on June 11, the Trump administration took the first step toward administering a final blow to the U.S. asylum system. The proposed rules, which impose nearly a dozen new bars to asylum, would rewrite asylum law to exclude nearly all people seeking refuge. Read More
New Regulation on Asylum Seeks to Erase Our Immigration History and Legacy
The Trump administration proposed a regulation that would eviscerate the United States asylum system. The proposed regulation would make it nearly impossible for most applicants to successfully claim humanitarian protection in the United States. Read More
5 Ways Trump’s Anti-Immigrant Agenda Gets in the Way of an Effective Coronavirus Response
In response to the coronavirus pandemic, the federal government has implemented sweeping revisions to U.S. immigration policy. Many of the changes fail to prioritize the health of immigrants or the general public. Some functions—like processing visas abroad and asylum claims at the border—have come to a virtual standstill. Yet many… Read More
New Report Reveals the Impact of COVID-19 Across the US Immigration System
The American Immigration Council's latest report examines major changes to the U.S. immigration system in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and the unique challenges the pandemic has created for noncitizens and government agencies. Read More
Trump Is Using the Coronavirus Pandemic as an Excuse to Permanently Close the Borders
The Trump administration has indefinitely extended its ban on immigration at U.S. land borders. The order was also expanded to include immigrants arriving at coastal ports. The ban is based on an order from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), allowing Customs and… Read More
The Impact of COVID-19 on Noncitizens and Across the U.S. Immigration System
This report identifies disruptions throughout the immigration system because of the COVID-19 pandemic and makes recommendations for improvements to the federal government’s response. Read More
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