The Biden administration will allow asylum officers to make the final decisions in migrants’ asylum claims, a significant change meant to turn the yearslong process into one resolved in a matter of months.
The departments of Homeland Security and Justice announced Thursday the implementation of a rule that grants asylum officers in U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, a DHS agency, permission to take on duties previously only handled by immigration judges. The change will take effect in late May.
“The current system for handling asylum claims at our borders has long needed repair,” DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said in a statement. “Through this rule, we are building a more functional and sensible asylum system to ensure that individuals who are eligible will receive protection more swiftly, while those who are not eligible will be rapidly removed.”
Attorney General Merrick Garland said the change will “reduce the burden on our immigration courts,” where approximately 500 judges have more than 1.5 million total immigration cases before them.
BORDER OFFICIALS EXPECT BIDEN TO END TRUMP’S TITLE 42 POLICY IN APRIL
This new action comes weeks before the Biden administration is expected to announce the end of a pandemic policy that had allowed most illegal immigrants to be turned away immediately, unable to seek asylum. The end of the temporary border policy, known as Title 42, means U.S. border officials will have more people in custody and seeking asylum.
Under Title 42, noncitizens have been turned away more than 1.6 million times since its implementation in March 2020. Under the new rule, those who had been expeditiously removed will be able to seek refuge. If their initial claim of having a credible fear of returning to their home country meets the threshold, it will proceed to the judges, and now asylum officers.
The departments did not indicate if asylum-seekers will be held in immigration detention through the monthslong process, though it is unlikely given the Biden administration’s opposition to it, and migrants will likely be released into the United States for the duration of their case. Asylum-seekers whose claims are denied will have their cases sent to Immigration and Customs Enforcement to begin the deportation process, which a judge must sign off on.
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President Joe Biden promised as a candidate to overhaul the U.S. asylum system, but he had not taken action during his first 14 months in office.
The new rule will be implemented in phases, DHS and the DOJ said.
