This may have been Trump’s most successful year yet for restricting immigration – By Molly O’Toole (LA Times) / Dec 20 2019
WASHINGTON — After countless promises and attempts to restrict immigration, 2019 may be remembered as the year in which President Trump got closest to fulfilling his central campaign pledge.
As the numbers of migrants arriving at the U.S. southern border reached their highest levels in more than a decade, peaking this last spring before dropping precipitously, Trump and his officials targeted immigration, aiming to block asylum seekers and refugees.
“Our country is full,” Trump said in an April visit to Calexico, Calif. “Can’t take you anymore, I’m sorry.”
Since January, under one policy alone, U.S. officials have forced more than 55,000 asylum seekers back to Mexico to await court hearings in the United States.
Officials termed the program the “Migrant Protection Protocols,” rejecting mounting evidence that Trump’s policy puts asylum seekers at risk of rape, kidnapping and death in Mexican border cities that rank among the most dangerous in the world, according to the U.S. State Department.
Judges, lawyers, advocates, lawmakers and current and former officials — including asylum officers and senior Homeland Security Department leadership — say that the policy appears to be violating the law.
Continue to article: https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2019-12-20/
