For decades, asylum has been a way for people to come to the United States when they are trying to escape persecution. They could be facing persecution based on their religion, their ethnicity, their political stance or something of this nature. They feel that the only way to be safe is to enter the United States and ask for protection, and asylum allows them to do so.
However, the United States is currently under an asylum ban. This is a controversial measure, and it is temporary in nature. But there are many questions about whether or not the ban will be lifted and if immigrants will be able to use asylum again.
Border crossings
The issue is that the asylum ban is tied to the number of border crossings encountered by Border Patrol officers. In many cases, these officers have encountered thousands of people illegally crossing the border every day. The government has banned the use of asylum, hoping to reduce these numbers, and the ban stays in place until there is an entire week where illegal border crossings average less than 1,500. Even if this number is reached and the ban is lifted, if the encounters go back up over 2,500 per day, the ban will be reinstated.
But it is unlikely that border crossings will even drop below 1,500. They haven’t done that in the last four years. Crossings were only under that level during the pandemic, which impacted travel. So, as long as current trends continue, the ban is essentially indefinite.
This certainly complicates the way that immigration laws work, and it helps to show why everyone who is coming to the United States needs to know exactly what legal options they have.