President Biden has been granted full freedom to overturn Trump’s “remain in Mexico” policy. The supreme court ruled in favor of the Biden administration to cancel the program on June 30, 2022.
The Migrant Protection Protocol policy as it is formally known of the Trump-era compelled authorities to detain asylum applicants from Central America or reject their US entry request while their cases were pending. The coronavirus interfered with the execution of the scheme, thus authorities relied on the provision of Title 42, a public emergency health order to carry out their deeds.
As a part of the Public Health Service Act of 1944, Title 42 was created to prevent the spread of communicable diseases in a country that could possibly migrate from another country. Upon conception, Jurisdiction was given to both the US Surgeon General and the president, with the president reigning supreme. In accordance with the law, “whenever the Surgeon General determines that by reason of the existence of any communicable disease in a foreign country there is serious danger of the introduction of such disease into the United States,” health officials have the authority to act. The responsibility to respond to such matters was later transferred to the CDC in 1966.
Former US president Donald J Trump solicited Title 42 in March 2020 to stop the spread of the coronavirus in immigration detention centers at the Mexico border. These detention centers have long been unhygienic and unsafe for people to inhabit. Trump’s Vice President Michael Pence ordered former CDC director Robert Redfield to enact Title 42, despite the objections of CDC scientists who said “there was no evidence that it would slow the virus’ spread in the US” (Garcia. J).
The New York Times disclosed that Stephen Miller, Trump’s senior adviser had previously pushed the idea to invoke Title 42 at the US-Mexico border in 2018, pre-ceding the COVID-19 outbreak. Whether the objective of enforcing the policy was solely to prevent the spread of the disease or there is a subtext of xenophobia, has been the discourse among many political analysts.
Prior to the supreme court ruling to overturn the Migrant Protection Protocol Policy, the Biden administration continued the program, until it hit a wall of opposition including those from the democratic party. Only unaccompanied children, significant law enforcement, officer and public safety, humanitarian, and public health interests authorities deemed acceptable were allowed to cross the border.
President Biden said there will be attempts to lessen the cruelty asylum seekers face through other means such as hiring more officers to cut the litigation process from years to six months.
The state of Texas and Missouri had sued the government to insist on the prolongation of the remain in Mexico program, but the court said the constitution grants the president the freewill to decide on this matter. Like all foreign policy issues, the constitution “reserves foreign policy questions like will we have negotiations with the nation of Mexico about all the migrants that have to remain there? That is the province of the president” (Terry Moran).
Great article without much bias in either direction.