Senate Republicans, who have long avowed that the nation’s asylum laws are the main cause of the recent massive surge of illegal immigration over the southern border, are pushing ahead with a fix without the support of any Democrats.
It’s a move that Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, hopes will at least start the negotiating that would lead to a bipartisan bill to stem the surge, which both parties acknowledge has created a humanitarian crisis at the southern border and encouraged the proliferation of human smugglers and other migrant abuses.
“Unless we change our laws, we are aiding and abetting the horrific practices we now see taking place at the southern border,” Graham said. “My bill fixes these problems.”
The Senate Judiciary Committee last week advanced Graham’s measure to change the nation’s asylum laws so that Central American migrants are less likely to attempt the dangerous trek to the U.S.
Democrats, who are in the minority, voted against the measure, arguing Graham changed committee rules to advance the measure more quickly.
But Democratic objections run much deeper. None have shown a desire to change the current asylum laws, which they believe help people fleeing violence and other dangers in their home countries. They’ve successfully pushed for tens of millions of dollars to be spent on finding housing, legal help, and other services for illegal immigrant families seeking asylum.
Democrats want additional funding to aid Central America, but they aren’t pushing for any change to the asylum laws, despite their role in provoking mass migration to the United States.
“You think you are going to get a lot of votes on the floor for this bill,” Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, a member of the panel, said, objecting to the measure. “You think the House is going to take this up? So what’s the point?”
More than 600,000 illegal immigrants have been apprehended along the southern border since October and most originated from the Northern Triangle countries of Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador. Along the journey, they are often exploited by human smugglers and face deadly conditions. Some have drowned attempting to cross the Rio Grande.
Graham’s measure would change current law prohibiting the United States from turning back asylum applicants if they originated from anywhere but neighboring Canada or Mexico.
Graham’s bill would require migrants from the Northern Triangle to apply for asylum at refugee processing centers established in their home countries or in Mexico, rather than in the United States where they often disappear into the interior.
It would also allow the United States to quickly return unaccompanied children back to their home countries, which is now prohibited for any migrant child that does not originate from Mexico or Canada.
The measure would allow border officials to detain illegal immigrant families for longer than the current limit of 20 days, now imposed thanks to a 2015 court ruling.
Because of the time limit, Immigration and Customs Enforcement has had to release 218,400 migrant family members into the United States since December.
Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky has not indicated whether he’ll bring Graham’s bill to the floor. Graham suggested to reporters last week that he may try to force Democrats to accept it by pushing to add it to must-pass spending legislation later this year.
Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York, who will be a key negotiator on spending bills, said House Democrats, who are in the majority, would never accept it.
“Lindsey knows that, too,” Schumer said.
Schumer would not address asylum laws when reporters asked him about Graham’s bill.
Instead, he proposed the Senate make another effort to pass comprehensive immigration reform. Schumer said he promoted the 2013 Senate-passed immigration reform bill in a recent call to the president to discuss immigration. It provided a pathway to citizenship for most of the nation’s illegal immigrants.
But Graham noted that measure, which he co-sponsored, does not address the generous asylum laws now luring hundreds of thousands of migrants to the United States.
Many of them pay smugglers thousands of dollars to help them navigate the dangerous journey to the U.S. border, where they can win release under current asylum laws if they are accompanied by a child.
At the hearing last week, Graham held up a photo of a Salvadoran father and his daughter, who drowned trying to cross the Rio Grande in Mexico.
“For us not to change our laws, we are aiding an abetting a system that puts people like this at risk,” Graham told Judiciary Democrats, passing around the photo.
“So the next father that comes to the Rio Grande, my hope is that you don’t try to cross the river and risk your and your child’s life. Nobody is going to pay $8,000 to go to Mexico.”
