Judge Jon S. Tigar of U.S. District Court in San Francisco issued a preliminary injunction against a new rule that would have effectively banned asylum claims in the United States for most Central American migrants, who have been arriving in record numbers this year.
The decision came on the same day that a federal judge in Washington, hearing a separate challenge, let the new rule stand, briefly delivering the administration a win. But Tigar’s order prevents the rule from being carried out until the legal issues can be debated more fully.
The rule, which has been applied on a limited basis in Texas, requires migrants to apply for and be denied asylum in the first safe country they arrive in on their way to the United States — in many of the current cases, Mexico — before applying for protections here. Because migrants from Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala make up the vast majority of asylum-seekers arriving at the southern border, the policy would virtually terminate asylum there.
“This new rule is likely invalid because it is inconsistent with the existing asylum laws,” Tigar wrote in his ruling Wednesday, adding that the government’s decision to put it in place was “arbitrary and capricious.”
The government has said that the rule intends to prevent exploitation of the asylum system by those who unlawfully immigrate to the United States. By clogging the immigration courts with meritless claims, the government argues, these applicants harm asylum-seekers with legitimate cases.
Under the policy, which the administration announced on July 15, only immigrants who have officially lost their bids for asylum in another country or who have been victims of “severe” human trafficking are permitted to apply in the United States. The policy reversed longstanding asylum laws that ensure people can seek safe haven no matter how they got to the United States.
“The court recognized, as it did with the first asylum ban, that the Trump administration was attempting an unlawful end run around asylum protections enacted by Congress,” said Lee Gelernt, the ACLU lawyer who argued the case in San Francisco.
A Justice Department spokesman contested the argument that the rule defied the law, saying that Congress gave the attorney general and homeland security secretary license to bar certain categories of migrants. “The bar here falls well within that broad grant of authority,” he said.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.