The new proposed rule would allow asylum officers to choose whether or not to approve a claim for protection at the Mexico border, bypassing backlogged immigration courts where cases can usually take years to be settled by judges, according to a summary of the regulation and Reuters interviews with U.S. officials.
The Biden administration tries to hire an extra 1,000 asylum officers and another 1,000 support staff, according to a senior Department of Homeland Security official, who refused to be named ahead of an official announcement.
The hiring spree would more than double the current crop of roughly 800 asylum officers and would be funded either by Congress or immigration application fee hikes.
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'We hope that we will be able to assess claims within three months of arrival,' the senior official stated. 'A lot of that will depend on the number of asylum officers that are hired.'
The new process is the most significant suggested change to the asylum system since Biden took office in January, and a key part of a 21-point immigration plan revealed in July.
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The proposal for the reworked asylum process comes as arrests in the U.S.-Mexico border have grown to the highest monthly levels in two decades, giving opposition Republicans ammunition to hammer Biden, a Democrat, for rolling back many of former President Donald Trump's prohibitive immigration policies.
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'If we can determine who is a legitimate asylum seeker and who is not earlier in the process, I think that drives down some of the incentives for irregular migration,' the official stated.
Biden's asylum overhaul is overshadowed by his choice to keep in place a Trump-era border expulsion policy recognized as Title 42, which the administration says is required to limit the spread of COVID-19 throughout the pandemic.
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Title 42, issued by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, blocks most migrants caught at the border from even being considered for asylum.
The proposal will go through a 60-day period of public comment, followed by a government review. The process to achieve it could stretch into early 2022, the DHS official said.
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The regulation would apply to immigrants who are placed in fast-track deportation proceedings known as 'expedited removal' on or after the rule's effect date.
The changes could enable more migrants in the expedited removal program to be freed from custody, with the possibility of being enrolled in an alternative form of monitoring as their cases are processed.
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