Administration wants to set fees, deny work permits to deter asylum-seekers

The US government's latest attempt to address the spike in asylum-seeking families at the southern border has been slammed by rights groups who said it is "another attack" and won't solve the problem.

US President Donald Trump proposed to set a fee for asylum-seekers filing their claims and for their work permit applications. The fee will not exceed the costs of adjudicating the application, according to the presidential memorandum released on April 29.

"We view it as just another attack on asylum-seekers. There've been so many examples starting with turning back asylum-seekers at the southern border, family separation, and 'remain in Mexico' policy," Melissa Crow, senior supervising attorney at Southern Poverty Law Center, told China Daily.

"The administration's rhetoric left no question that they are trying to deter asylum-seekers from coming to our country," she said.

The administration's plan to impose fees on asylum applications is going to make it even harder to apply than it already is, said Crow.

"They've got to grant some kind of waiver for people who are too poor to afford whatever the fee is - we don't know how burdensome it would be," she said.

In the memorandum, Trump also proposes new regulations to ensure that applications are adjudicated within 180 days of filing.

"He (Trump) says the goal was to shorten the processing time but it's not clear to me that it's going to actually happen," said Crow.

Due to a backlog in immigration courts, those who pass the initial interview are expected to wait for months or years for their cases to be adjudicated.

"They are still going to give people asylum hearings, although it did say streamlined hearings," said Crow.

In many cases, the people arriving at a US border after having fled persecution don't have any claim other than an asylum claim, so the hearing isn't going to be different from it was, she explained.

Crow also said the administration's proposal to not grant work permits for people who have entered the country between ports of entry or to revoke work authorization from certain people is "crazy".

"The Immigration and Nationality Act is clear that asylum is available to anyone, no matter whether they enter at the port of entry or between ports of entry because asylum-seekers flee their countries and are desperate to find a haven," she said. "These people have no other way to survive and they are willing to work and contribute to our economy. So it really seems kind of absurd," she said.

A political tactic

The past few months have seen an influx of Central American migrants, especially families, into the United States.

From October 2018 to March, the US Border Patrol has seen a more than 370 percent increase in the number of family units apprehended compared to the same time period of the previous year, according to the latest data of US Customs and Border Protection, or CBP.

In March, 60 percent of apprehensions along the Southwest border were family units and unaccompanied children, made up predominantly of individuals from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador, said CBP.

The Trump government's "national security crisis" is a political tactic and not a real security crisis, said Richard Waxman, president of Community Wellness Consulting LLC in San Rafael, California. His group has been advocating for refugees and immigrants for more than two years.

"There is truly a humanitarian crisis that needs a humanitarian approach and we believe the funds he is demanding for a wall should be spent solving the problems that are driving people away from their homes to our borders seeking asylum from extreme gang violence, natural disasters and hopelessness in their own countries," he said.

"The fact that our government isn't fulfilling its obligation under domestic and international law to provide protection, or even give these people access to apply for protection, is certainly not going to address the root causes of these problems," said Crow.