In August, the Supreme Court ordered the Biden administration to reinstate the Trump-era “Remain in Mexico” policy, which was successful in bringing some order to the chaotic refugee situation at the southern border.
The policy called for refugees who were apprehended at the U.S. border with Mexico to remain in that country until their asylum court cases were heard. But Biden ended that policy and the Supreme Court ordered it to be reinstated.
But now Biden is doubling down and ordering that, once again, the policy be terminated.
What the Biden administration is hoping is that a new agreement with Mexico can be negotiated that would accomplish the same thing: keeping migrants looking for asylum in Mexico until their court cases are heard.
Meanwhile, DHS is playing a shell game with the law and the Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court in August upheld a lower court decision requiring the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to re-implement what is formally known as the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP).
DHS on Wednesday announced it would uphold that injunction “in good faith,” but the agency plans to again rescind MPP once the injunction is lifted.
“A new memorandum terminating MPP will not take effect until the current injunction is lifted by court order,” reads the DHS announcement. “In issuing a new memorandum terminating MPP, the Department intends to address the concerns raised by the courts with respect to the prior memorandum.”
So the Biden administration will “uphold the injunction.” Once it’s lifted because DHS will be in compliance, a new memorandum scrapping the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP) — the formal name of the Remain in Mexico policy — will be issued.
He said the Biden administration should take a page out of the the Trump administration’s playbook, when it continually rewrote its Muslim ban.
“They wrote in one way, it got struck down. They write it again, it goes to the Supreme Court. They write it again, each time curing whatever defects the court is describing in order to make it harder to attack. And surely you could do that here, and the court decisions give you the road map for how to do it. It’s not rocket science,” Arulanantham said.
That would involve crafting a lengthy memo detailing the rationale for rescinding MPP, which the Biden administration is now doing.
It may not be rocket science but it certainly violates the spirit of the law.
Biden’s State Department is negotiating with Mexico over keeping the asylum seekers in Mexico while their cases are being adjudicated. The agreement that emerges will probably not be materially different than Trump’s deal. And why bother to change the deal in the first place?
Orange man bad, of course.
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