Trump’s Remain in Mexico Policy Hits Legal Roadblock but Supreme Court Likely Awaits

A federal judge says President Donald Trump’s Remain in Mexico policy, which kept tens of thousands of prospective immigrants out of the United States while awaiting immigration proceedings, violates their rights to legal representation and a fair hearing.

The policy, which began during Trump’s first term in January 2019, affected non-Mexicans who fled their homelands and reached or crossed the southern U.S. border, requiring them to wait in Mexico, often in dangerous conditions, until immigration judges could hear their cases. {snip}

Trump administration officials said Remain in Mexico was needed to maintain control of the border. But U.S. District Judge Jesus Bernal of Riverside said last week that migrants, like U.S. residents, are entitled to equal participation in legal proceedings that will determine where they live.

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Before Trump’s 2019 policy was halted by President Joe Biden in 2021, the judge said, about 67,000 asylum-seekers had been forced to remain in Mexico and only 7% of them were eventually able to find attorneys for their U.S. hearings, compared to 80% under previous administrations.

And only 1.1% of those migrants were granted asylum, Bernal said, less than 1/26th of the success rate of asylum-seekers from Central America who were not affected by the policy.

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Bernal’s ruling, if upheld, would apply to all immigrants who reached the Mexican border. But the last word could come from the Supreme Court, which has been mostly supportive of Trump’s immigration restrictions.

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