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The Biden administration will get to argue its case before the US Supreme Court as it tries to end the Trump-era “Remain in Mexico” policy for asylum-seeking migrants at the southern border.
The court agreed Friday to hear the White House’s appeal after several defeats in lower court rulings as the administration looked to shelf the 2019 policy, which requires migrants seeking asylum in the US to wait in Mexico while their cases are pending.
President Biden had railed against the policy as a candidate and put it on pause just hours after taking office in January 2021, with the Department of Homeland Security officially ending it in June of that year.
A massive surge of migrants to the southern border soon followed and Missouri and Texas sued to reinstate the policy. A federal judge ordered the administration to put it back in place — leaving the Biden administration scrambling to relaunch the program and send asylum seekers back across the border. The Biden administration implemented changes to the policy, including ending the separation of families at the border.
An appeals court then rejected a bid by the Biden administration to overturn the ruling on the policy, which is formally called the Migrant Protection Protocols.
Arguments before the Supreme Court justices will take place in April, with a decision expected by June. The Department of Justice had petitioned the highest court in the land to expedite the case, saying that delaying it until the court’s next term could push a resolution to 2023.
“In the meantime, the government would be forced to continue negotiating with Mexico to maintain a controversial program that it has already twice determined is no longer in the best interests of the United States,” the December petition said.
Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas has acknowledged the “Remain in Mexico” likely led to fewer illegal border crossings in 2019, said the policy came with “substantial and unjustifiable human costs” that included migrants facing violence in Mexico, the AP reported.
Some 572 people have been returned to Mexico from the restart of “Remain in Mexico” in December through Feb. 13, the AP reported.
Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020, the US has also expelled more than 1.5 million migrants without their asylum cases heard.
With Post wires
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