The Department of Homeland Security said the Migrant Protection Protocols program would be unraveled “quickly.”
The United States says it has ended a Trump-era policy requiring asylum seekers to wait in Mexico for immigration status hearings following a Supreme Court ruling in favor of the attempt of President Joe Biden to abandon the initiative.
The Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP) program, informally known as “Remain in Mexico,” will be unwound in a “quick and orderly manner,” the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said in a statement Monday.
The policy, which was launched in 2019 under former Republican President Donald Trump, has caused non-Mexican asylum seekers to return to Mexico to await resolution of their cases in the United States, which sometimes takes months or years.
No more people will be enrolled in the program and those currently waiting in Mexico will be removed from the program and allowed to enter the United States upon their return for their next scheduled court dates, DHS said in a statement.
He added that the policy has “endemic flaws, imposes unjustifiable human costs, and diverts resources and personnel from other priority efforts to secure our border.”
The decision to scrap the program came after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on June 30 in favor of Biden’s bid to end it.
But the timing of the announcement was uncertain, with DHS officials saying they had to wait for the court to certify the ruling and for a Trump-appointed judge, Matthew Kacsmaryk in Amarillo, Texas, to then lift his injunction to drop the case. Politics. .
The Supreme Court certified its decision last week and Kacsmaryk lifted its injunction on Monday.
Tens of thousands dismissed
Under Trump, who has made restricting legal and illegal immigration to the United States a central tenet of his tenure, the initiative forced about 70,000 non-Mexican asylum seekers across the border where they waited in often squalid and dangerous conditions.
Biden, a Democrat, ended the MPP shortly after taking office in January 2021 as part of his effort to reverse the hardline policies of his Republican predecessor.
But the termination was blocked by a federal judge in August 2021, forcing Biden to restart the program and ultimately sending the legal fight to the Supreme Court.
As of July 6, nearly 5,800 asylum seekers had been sent to Mexico under a revamped version of the program, according to DHS statistics.
Nicaraguans accounted for the largest number of those affected, with Cuban, Colombian and Venezuelan nationals also affected.
Despite Washington’s decision to abandon the policy, many questions remain about its ongoing effects, including whether those whose claims have been denied or denied will get a second chance or whether those whose next court dates are months away will be allowed to return to the United States sooner. .
DHS said it would provide additional information “in the coming days.”
