A group of Democrats led by House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler declared President Trump’s safe third-country agreement with Guatemala is illegal because the Central American nation does not meet the conditions for determining asylum.
“Once again the president is attempting to illegally circumvent our immigration laws in his all-out effort to stop asylum seekers from coming to the United States, going so far as to bully a foreign country with threats of tariffs and visa bans to force the agreement,” Nadler of New York and fellow Democrats said Monday. “Guatemala’s immigration laws and infrastructure are woefully inadequate and unable to meet the needs of migrants coming from other countries in Central America.”
The Trump administration announced the United States has agreed on a policy with Guatemala that will make it easier to deport illegal immigrants if they first passed through Guatemala on their way to the U.S. border.
Nadler, along with Reps. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., and Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., who are chairwomen for immigration subcommittees, said the conditions in Guatemala make it impossible for the country to provide “full and fair” procedures for determining qualifications for asylum.
Nadler cited the country’s homicide rate of 26.1 per 100,000 people.
“It is clear to anyone looking at what is happening in Guatemala that it cannot reasonably be classified as a ‘safe third country,’” the trio said in the statement. “Instead of taking these illegal and divisive actions, President Trump should be working with Congress to pass bipartisan solutions that address the root causes of migration.”
President Trump sought the agreement with Guatemala to try to stem the massive flow of illegal immigration from Central America that has created a humanitarian crisis along the U.S. southern border.
According to U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Border Patrol agents have apprehended 688,375 illegal immigrants along the southwest border since October and many of them traveled from Central America.
