Biden's Border Action Immediately Hit with Challenge from His Own Side as ACLU Announces Lawsuit
President Joe Biden’s Tuesday executive order barring illegal immigrants in the United States from obtaining asylum has been met with opposition from the American Civil Liberties Union.
The left-leaning national civil rights organization slammed the Biden administration’s executive action in a Tuesday post on X as one that “will severely restrict” what the ACLU claims to be migrants’ “legal right to seek asylum.”
Accusing the Biden White House of “putting tens of thousands of lives at risk” in a policy decision that mirrors the Trump administration’s restrictions against unlawful immigration, the organization vowed to challenge the decision in court.
BREAKING: The Biden administration just announced an executive order that will severely restrict people’s legal right to seek asylum, putting tens of thousands of lives at risk.
This action takes the same approach as the Trump administration’s asylum ban. We will be challenging…
— ACLU (@ACLU) June 4, 2024
The ACLU was not alone in its criticism of Biden’s actions.
Although many Democrats will hail the Biden administration’s executive action as an attempt to outflank the Republican Party, Biden, through his policy, is “screwing over actual asylum-seekers who he promised to support,” former MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan wrote on X.
Lots of Dems today will celebrate this as Biden playing 3-D chess on the border and outflanking the GOP. He’s not. He’s just screwing over actual asylum-seekers who he promised to support – and giving Trump the power/precedent to do even worse via executive order next year.
Sigh. https://t.co/y2vwPzD4Ia— Mehdi Hasan (@mehdirhasan) June 4, 2024
Should there be a Republican victory in the 2024 presidential election, a future Trump administration will have the “power” and “precedent” necessary to enforce more stringent immigration policies thanks to Biden’s Tuesday proclamation, Hasan further wrote.
Democratic House Rep. Nydia Velazquez of New York expressed disappointment with Biden’s decision. “We need comprehensive immigration reform, not a return of Trump-era policies,” the congresswoman wrote in a Tuesday post on X.
I’m extremely disappointed with this decision by @POTUS. We need comprehensive immigration reform, not a return of Trump-era policies.
The right to seek asylum is fundamental in the United States, and we must never abandon that idea.https://t.co/xC6dx6NC5R
— Rep. Nydia Velazquez (@NydiaVelazquez) June 4, 2024
“The right to seek asylum is fundamental in the United States, and we must never abandon that idea,” Velazquez added.
The president’s executive action will put a hold on the processing of asylum applications for those who breach the border illegally.
According to a Tuesday news release from the White House, the objective of the executive action is to “make it easier for immigration officers to quickly remove individuals who do not have a legal basis to remain in the United States.”
The White House, however, stressed in its statement that the decision is a temporary measure that will be “discontinued when the number of migrants who cross the border between ports of entry is low enough for America’s system to safely and effectively manage border operations.”
“These actions also include similar humanitarian exceptions to those included in the bipartisan border agreement announced in the Senate, including those for unaccompanied children and victims of trafficking,” the news release stated.
The White House, according to reporting from the Associated Press, had briefed members of Congress before his public announcement that he would sign the executive order.
The border closures would be triggered once the average rate of daily encounters of illegal migrants by border patrol officers hit 2,500 for seven consecutive days. Tuesday’s announcement indicated that these conditions had been met and that the executive order would go into effect at 12:01 a.m. on Wednesday.
Once the encounters fall below 1,500 for seven consecutive days, the borders may be reopened.
When the borders are closed, border officers are permitted to send illegal immigrants back to Mexico or their countries of origin within hours or days, the New York Times reported.
According to the Times, Biden’s executive order is similar to prior legislation that Republicans, encouraged by former President and presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, voted down in February, citing a lack of efficacy.
“Donald Trump begged them to vote ‘no’ because he was worried that more border enforcement would hurt him politically,” White House spokesman Andrew Bates claimed on Tuesday, the Times reported.
Trump, according to the outlet, had previously tried to shut down the border to illegal immigrants claiming asylum, attempts which succeeded only during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, when he was able to use pandemic-era regulations to shutter the border.
“After nearly four years of his failed, weak, leadership — pathetic leadership — Crooked Joe Biden is pretending to finally do something about the border,” Trump said in a video shared on Truth Social.
“But in fact, it’s all about show, because he knows we have a debate coming up in three weeks,” Trump added.
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