Slicer97 said:
Opalka said:
Republicans were on the committee that helped write the bill. It was set to pass until Trump flexed his muscles and got republicans in line. Trump knew that if it passed, he'd lose that talking point in this election cycle. This isn't rocket science, it was in plain site, why Trump (and MAGA) wanted this bill to fail.
Can you explain why new legislation was needed to secure the border?
There's two main reasons legislation is necessary. I posted a lot of this earlier in the thread, so apologies for the repeat.
First, Trump's policies were effective at the time but Trump didn't fix the underlying structural issues with our immigration system. He didn't modernize our asylum process (which was never meant to handle these volumes at the border, and is being abused) and he didn't do anything to improve the process for legal immigration.
Second, many of Trump's actions were struck down by the courts or facing legal challenges. I put this in another thread, but these are some of major policy changes under Trump that were struck down:
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- 2017 - ICE ended the Family Case Management Program and rolled out a policy of prolonged and indefinite detention of asylum seekers; Blocked by a federal court in 2018 in Damus v. McAleenan
- 2018 - Jeff Sessions announced a "zero-tolerance" policy to criminally prosecute asylum seekers, triggering widespread family separation. Federal judge ruled against this practice in Ms. L v Ice; Civil lawsuits are still ongoing for civil rights violations
- 2018 - Jeff Sessions introduced policies to block asylum seekers suffering from domestic and gang violence; Federal judge blocked this in Dec 2018 in Grace v. Whitaker
- 2018 - CBP implemented "turn back" / metering policy to turn away asylum seekers and force them to wait weeks or months before applying; Federal judge found this illegal in Al Otro Lado v. Nielsen
- 2018 - Trump admin barred migrants crossing outside ports of entry from asylum eligibility; Multiple lawsuits found this illegal, including at the appeals court level (for example East Bay Sanctuary Covenant v. Trump)
- 2019 - MPP (Remain in Mexico) - In April 2019 a federal district court in California granted a preliminary injunction, which would have temporarily halted the policy. The Ninth Circuit initially stayed the injunction allowing MPP to remain in effect but restored it in February 2020, ruling unequivocally that MPP violates both U.S. and international law. The government then appealed to the Supreme Court, which put the injunction on hold as it considered the case, leaving the policy in place until the Biden administration terminated it. Following the termination, the Supreme Court sent the case back to the district court, which vacated the injunction as moot. The labor union representing asylum officers filed an amicus brief with the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals asking the court to strike down MPP as a directive that was "fundamentally contrary to the moral fabric of our nation and our international and domestic legal obligations."
- 2019 - USCIS issued a memo to take away protections from unaccompanied minors during the asylum process; Blocked by a federal judge with a restraining order in August 2019 (J.O.P. v. U.S. Department of Homeland Security), settlement discussions are ongoing
We can look specifically at restricting asylum to ports of entry since Ags With Kids and I were debating this:
- Trump blocked asylum outside ports of entry in 2018 (see above)
- ACLU sues, court rules Trump's action is illegal
- Biden asks Congress for explicit authority to block asylum under some conditions
- The Senate border bill includes this authority but gets shot down
- After the bill died, Biden blocks asylum outside ports of entry (similar action to Trump with a few tweaks)
- ACLU plans to sue again and there's a really good chance Biden's change gets blocked
So we need new laws, there has to be a change coming from Congress on this.