Donald Trump’s government announced Tuesday a change in the asylum application procedure in the United States, a reform presented as a simplification but which could accelerate the expulsion of hundreds of thousands of asylum seekers.
With this new turn of the screw by the American executive on immigration, asylum requests can now be sent directly to immigration judges without prior interview with an immigration officer.
The current system, which allows these two reviews of the file, “allows foreigners to try to have a second chance with asylum,” denounces the Ministry of Internal Security in a press release.
The new provisions “will shorten the total time spent by asylum officers and immigration judges to rule on asylum applications,” the ministry further underlines.
Up to 444,724 people whose procedure is in progress “could be affected” by this new regulation, out of the nearly 1.5 million files currently being examined, specifies the ministry.
“The US asylum system exists to protect people who genuinely fear persecution,” said Joseph Edlow, director of Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), the department’s agency responsible for asylum applications.
The reform announced Tuesday, with immediate effect, will “ensure that resources are devoted to the rapid processing of these requests, rather than those of people who seek to use the system as a loophole” by remaining in the territory while waiting for a final decision, he added, quoted in the press release.
Re-elected to the White House on the promise of a tougher migration policy, Donald Trump and his government have increased measures in this direction and led a massive expulsion campaign of undocumented immigrants living in the United States.
