FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

DATE: June 12, 2024

MEDIA CONTACT: Raya Steier, rsteier@lccrsf.org, C:530-723-2426

***STATEMENT***

On June 4, 2024, President Biden enacted a ruthless asylum ban that places arbitrary limits on asylum seekers’ ability to present their claims at our southern border, exposing individuals who have escaped life-threatening circumstances to further risk. 

President Biden’s Executive Order allows the U.S. government to summarily deport people seeking safety at the border. The new policy mandates the immediate deportation of asylum seekers once the daily average of crossings at the border exceeds 2,500 individuals between points of entry. The border would reopen 14 days after that number falls to an average of less than 1,500 daily crossings over seven days. A quota system arbitrarily denies thousands of individuals their right to seek asylum, without any legal process. With this new policy, the U.S. blatantly violates its own asylum laws, along with international refugee laws, that guarantee the right to seek asylum regardless of one’s mode of entry.

This order signifies a pernicious revival of the Trump administration’s failed immigration policies and disastrous asylum bans. Deterrence-based policies inevitably intensify suffering, increase fatalities, and drain vital immigration resources.

President Biden’s order eviscerates asylum rights and prioritizes political gain over the urgent safety and protection of vulnerable individuals fleeing war, poverty, authoritarianism, and violence. We demand an immediate rescission of this order and call for policies that uphold the right to seek asylum, guarantee due process for asylum seekers, and foster compassion at our borders.

“Biden’s anti-immigrant order is in direct violation of both U.S. and international refugee law, which dictate that every individual, regardless of how they arrive, has the right to seek asylum. By abandoning these fundamental principles, this administration is trading vulnerable lives for the sake of political expediency. Implementing a deterrence-based quota system that lacks due process and fails to consider the individual’s reasons for seeking asylum only exacerbates the existing challenges to our immigration system and leads to immoral and inhumane results.” – Amanda Bhuket, Immigrant Justice Program Director, Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area (LCCRSF)

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