Biden-Harris administration’s new immigration policy to impact Black migrants
“This is going to create insurmountable burdens with a particularly harsh impact on Black and indigenous people seeking safety,” said Amy Fischer, Amnesty International advocacy director for the Americas.
The Biden-Harris administration’s latest asylum regulation could greatly impact Black migrants traveling to the U.S. to seek refuge.
Last month, the administration announced a new immigration rule prohibiting migrants from seeking asylum in the U.S. if they fail to seek asylum in other countries as they journey to the U.S.-Mexico border.
Amy Fischer, Amnesty International advocacy director for the Americas, criticized Biden’s policy and told theGrio that the administration is “forgetting [its] legal responsibilities under both U.S. and international law to allow asylum at the border.”
“[The administration] is really pushing for this invasionist rhetoric that we’ve heard from the Republicans as well around this idea that asylum seekers and immigrants are going to overwhelm communities. And it’s just frankly not true,” she asserted.
Fischer continued, “This is going to create insurmountable burdens with a particularly harsh impact on Black and indigenous people seeking safety because those are the ones that are going to have the least opportunity to find safety in any of these countries.”
In a statement obtained by theGrio, Senators Ben Ray Luján (D-NM), Bob Menendez (D-NJ), Cory Booker (D-NJ) and Alex Padilla (D-CA) condemned Biden’s immigration policy.
“We are deeply disappointed that the Administration has chosen to move forward with publishing this proposed rule, which only perpetuates the harmful myth that asylum seekers are a threat to this nation,” the statement read.
It continued, “We have an obligation to protect vulnerable migrants under domestic and international law and should not leave vulnerable migrants stranded in countries unable to protect them.”
With Title 42 set to expire in a couple of months, an administration official told CNN that this new regulation is “temporary” and was created out of “necessity.”
Title 42, which was enacted during the COVID-19 pandemic, grants the U.S. authority to turn away hundreds of thousands of migrants from the nation to stop the spread of “communicable diseases.”
Fischer told theGrio that this new policy will expand Title 42 and that the Biden administration’s border policies are “no different” than policies proposed under the Trump administration.
“On the campaign trail [Biden] expressed a commitment to human rights…to restore asylum at the border. The reality is [the administration] is doing quite the opposite.”
She continued, “This is an asylum ban that looks eerily similar to the one that the Trump administration tried” and was struck down in court.
In their statement to theGrio, congressional members asked Biden and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas “to reverse course and pave a better path forward that protects the right to asylum.”
Fischer told theGrio, that “these [immigration] bans are not the right way.”
“We have the solutions…there needs to be a massive investment in community-based organizations that can welcome people with dignity to ensure that the people that are arriving here can go into communities where they can have access to work permits so that they can get jobs and build their lives,” she said.
Title 42 is set to expire in May which means this new asylum policy would replace it and could remain in place for the next two years, according to the Associated Press.
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