In an effort to permanently block the new Biden administration rule that allows more asylum seekers to avoid deportation at the border and remain in the United States, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton filed a lawsuit Thursday against President Biden Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, among others.
The suit filed to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas underlines that DHS’s Interim Rule transfers significant authority from immigration judges to asylum officers, limits immigration-judge review to applications’ denials, and upends the entire adjudicatory system to the benefit of aliens.
The state of Texas now seeks to block the DHS policy aimed at changing the processing system for immigrants in credible fear of persecution in their home countries, whose cases under the current law are handled by immigration judges.
If the DHS rule takes effect on May 29, as planned, that authority will be transferred to asylum officers, who will also be given the authority to parole asylum seekers into the US if detaining that migrant during the proceedings is deemed impracticable.
Such policy change, according to the State of Texas’ claims, will result in an increased number of migrants being released into the state, costing its taxpayers tens of millions of dollars.
Texas lawsuit follows just one day after Mayorkas claimed in its testimony before the US Congress that DHS has effectively managed the ongoing border crisis that, in reality, appears far from managed.
According to DHS estimates, the rate of border encounters is expected to spike in the near future to 18,000 per day, pointing as a reason for the spike its plan to end Trump-era Title 42, COVID-19 restriction allowing for the speedy deportation of most migrants.
The plan to end Title 42 deportations remains an end goal for the Biden administration, whose last attempt in that direction has been blocked by a federal judge in Louisiana.
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