CLOSE Despite days of walking, illness, and uncertainty, Honduran native Joel Eduardo Espinar is determined to continue the arduous trek with his wife and children as part of a migrant caravan winding its way through Mexico toward the U.S. border. (Nov 2) AP

Members of the Central American migrant caravan move in the early hours towards their next destination on Nov. 04, 2018 in Isla, Mexico. (Photo: Spencer Platt, Getty Images)

WASHINGTON – The American Civil Liberties Union is seeking a court injunction to block President Donald Trump's new restrictions on asylum, arguing in a lawsuit filed Friday that the policy violates federal immigration law.

“The new asylum ban is flatly unlawful and may result in many people being sent back to danger," said Lee Gelernt, deputy director of the ACLU's Immigrants' Rights Project.

“Neither the President nor the Attorney General may override the immigration laws enacted by Congress,” Gelernt said. The ACLU, along with the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Center for Constitutional Rights, filed the lawsuit on behalf of several refugee and immigrant advocacy groups in federal court in Northern California on Friday.

The Trump administration said the president had acted with "clear legal authority" and blasted the lawsuit as defending the rights of immigrants to enter the U.S. illegally.

"The president has the right to suspend the entry of aliens if he determines it to be in the national interest – and that is what President Trump has done," the Justice and Homeland Security departments said in a joint statement Friday evening.

Trump made the policy official on Friday by signing a proclamation that denies asylum to immigrants who enter the U.S. illegally, rather through a port of entry – a move aimed at a caravan of Central American migrants moving toward the U.S.-Mexico border.

In its legal challenge, the ACLU argues that Trump's move flouts a 1965 law that says any foreigner who arrives in the U.S. – "whether or not at a designated port of arrival" – may apply for asylum. In addition, the suit charges the president with violating a 1946 law that spells out how the Executive Branch can develop and issue regulations.

That administrative law allows courts to nix any actions that are "arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion, or otherwise not in accordance with law" or contrary to constitutional rights.

“Ever since the horrors of World War II, the world’s nations have committed to giving asylum seekers the opportunity to seek safe haven," said Baher Azmy, legal director of the Center for Constitutional Rights. "The Trump administration cannot defy this most elementary humanitarian principle, in violation of U.S. and international law, with a flip of a presidential pen.”

Under the new White House policy, immigrants who enter illegally would be placed into expedited deportation proceedings instead of being granted access to the asylum process, according to a posting by the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security on the Federal Register late Thursday.

‘Flooding our country’

“They’re flooding our country, we’re not letting them in. But they’re trying to flood our country," Trump said Friday after signing the proclamation.

Asylum is a form of protection granted to people who fear persecution in their home countries based on their race, religion, nationality, membership in a particular social group or their political opinion. From 2000 to 2016, the United States granted asylum to an average of 26,651 foreigners a year, according to Department of Homeland Security data.

Gelernt said there are already long lines at the legal ports of entry along the U.S.-Mexico border, forcing desperate migrants into extended limbo as they seek to plead their case for asylum. Most of the migrants have already made arduous journeys to reach the U.S. border.

The long waits at legal ports of entry have driven some to attempt illegal crossings and request asylum that way. When the last caravan reached the US in April, 401 presented themselves at ports of entry, as the administration has urged them to do, but 122 entered the country illegally to request asylum, according to data from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.

Trump and other White House officials have claimed there is "rampant abuse" in the nation's asylum system, which saw an increase in claims from 5,000 in 2008 to 97,000 in 2018, mostly fueled by Central Americans fleeing violence and poverty in their home countries.

“Our asylum system is overwhelmed with too many meritless asylum claims from aliens who place a tremendous burden on our resources, preventing us from being able to expeditiously grant asylum to those who truly deserve it,” Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen and Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker said in a joint statement on Thursday previewing Friday's proclamation.

On Friday, Trump blamed Democrats for blocking reform that he said was needed to fix "obsolete" and "incompetent" immigration laws.

"They are the worst laws any country has anywhere in the world, and it's only because we don't have the Democrats' votes," he told reporters before leaving for a trip to Paris. "We need Democrat votes so we can change immigration, and we'll have no trouble whatsoever at the border."

Trump restrictions ‘shortsighted’

Rep. Eliot Engel, a New York Democrat who is poised to become chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee in the next Congress, called Trump’s asylum restrictions “shortsighted.” He said the new Democratic majority will examine Trump’s actions on a broad range of issues, including immigration.

"The president has the wrong attitude when it comes to immigration or new people coming to this country. He’s afraid of them," Engel said. "I don’t know why. We are a nation of immigrants," he added, noting his own grandparents immigrated to the U.S. 110 years ago.

Sen. Bob Menendez, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee, was more blunt.

"The president’s xenophobic effort to exploit the suffering of desperate mothers and children legally seeking asylum is clearly intended for crude political distraction from his own failures," the New Jersey Democrat said.

Trump's policy would create "a bottleneck at ports of entry, which will effectively shut the door on vulnerable individuals seeking asylum," he added. "I refuse to stand by as this administration continues to systematically undermine asylum and refugee protection."

Friday’s action follows several other steps taken by the administration to halt the caravan. The Pentagon dispatched more than 7,000 active-duty military troops to the border. And U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials have repositioned agents from around the country to line the southern border to prevent illegal entries.

During a trip to the border, CBP Commissioner Kevin McAleenan said he viewed the oncoming caravan as a "law enforcement situation" and his officers could not speed up the process to interview asylum seekers.

Officials with the departments of Justice and Homeland Security said they are negotiating with Mexico about accepting deported migrants. Mexico has already agreed to grant asylum to immigrants moving north from Central America, largely from Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador.

U.S. officials say that's the preferred location to receive asylum from persecution, but many migrants want to come to the United States.

More: President Trump denies asylum for immigrants at U.S. border who enter outside ports of entry

Read or Share this story: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2018/11/09/donald-trump-migrant-caravan-aclu-federal-court-immigration-immigration-border-central-americans/1940528002/</s>(Reuters) - Civil rights groups said on Friday they had filed a federal lawsuit challenging the legality of U.S. President Donald Trump’s newly announced restrictions that would effectively bar illegal migrants from Mexico from qualifying for asylum.

The lawsuit in San Francisco federal court by the American Civil Liberties Union, Southern Poverty Law Center and Center for Constitutional Rights seeks an injunction to prevent the administration from implementing the asylum policy.

Trump on Friday signed a proclamation that effectively will suspend the granting of asylum to migrants who cross the U.S. border with Mexico illegally for up to 90 days.

The order, which goes into effect on Saturday, means that migrants will have to present themselves at U.S. ports of entry to qualify for asylum.

Civil rights groups have said that U.S. immigration law clearly allows anyone present in the country to seek asylum, regardless of how they crossed the border.

“President Trump’s new asylum ban is illegal. Neither the president nor his cabinet secretaries can override the clear commands of U.S. law, but that’s exactly what they’re trying to do,” Omar Jadwat of the American Civil Liberties Union said in a statement.</s>Trump Administration Aims To Deny Asylum To Migrants Who Enter U.S. Illegally

The Trump administration announced new measures Thursday to deny asylum to migrants who enter the country illegally. On Friday, the administration will announce which countries are affected.</s>President Donald Trump on Friday invoked extraordinary national security powers to deny asylum to migrants who enter the country illegally, tightening the border as caravans of Central Americans slowly approach the United States.

Trump is using the same powers he used to push through a version of the travel ban that was upheld by the Supreme Court. The proclamation puts into place regulations adopted Thursday that circumvent laws stating that anyone is eligible for asylum no matter how he or she enters the country.

"We need people in our country but they have to come in legally and they have to have merit," Trump said Friday as he prepared to depart for Paris.

The measures are meant to funnel asylum seekers through official border crossings for speedy rulings, officials said, instead of having them try to circumvent such crossings on the nearly 2,000-mile (3,200-kilometer) border. But the busy ports of entry already have long lines and waits, forcing immigration officials to tell some migrants to turn around and come back to make their claims.

The move was spurred in part by caravans of Central American migrants slowly moving north on foot but will apply to anyone caught crossing illegally, officials said Thursday. It's unknown whether those in the caravan, many fleeing violence in their homeland, plan to cross illegally.

Administration officials said those denied asylum under the proclamation may be eligible for similar forms of protection if they fear returning to their countries, though they would be subject to a tougher threshold. Those forms of protection include "withholding of removal" — which is similar to asylum, but doesn't allow for green cards or bringing families — or asylum under the United Nations Convention Against Torture.

The announcement was the latest push to enforce Trump's hardline stance on immigration through regulatory changes and presidential orders, bypassing Congress. But those efforts have been largely thwarted by legal challenges and, in the case of family separations this year, stymied by a global outcry that prompted Trump to scrap them.

The new changes were likely to be met with legal challenges, too. Omar Jadwat, director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Immigrants' Rights Project, said Thursday they were clearly illegal.

"U.S. law specifically allows individuals to apply for asylum whether or not they are at a port of entry. It is illegal to circumvent that by agency or presidential decree," he said.

Curbing immigration has been a signature issue for Trump, who pushed it hard in the days leading up to Tuesday's midterm elections, railing against the caravans that are still hundreds of miles from the border.

He has made little mention of the issue since the election but has sent troops to the border in response. As of Thursday, there are more than 5,600 U.S. troops deployed to the border mission, with about 550 actually working on the border in Texas. The military is expected to have the vast majority of the more than 7,000 troops planned for the mission deployed by Monday, and that number could grow.

Trump also suggested he'd revoke the right to citizenship for babies born to non-U.S. citizens on American soil and erect massive "tent cities" to detain migrants. Those issues were not addressed by the regulations Thursday.

The administration has long said immigration officials are drowning in asylum cases partly because people falsely claim asylum and then live in the U.S. with work permits.

The asylum section of the Immigration and Nationality Act says a migrant is allowed to make a claim up to a year after arriving in the U.S., and it doesn't matter how they arrive — illegally or through a border crossing.

Migrants who cross illegally are generally arrested and often seek asylum or some other form of protection. Claims have spiked in recent years, and there is a backlog of more than 800,000 cases pending in immigration court. Generally, only about 20 percent of applicants are approved.

Trump has long said those seeking asylum should come through legal ports of entry. But many migrants are unaware of that guidance, and official border crossings have grown clogged.

Officials have turned away asylum seekers at border crossings because of overcrowding, telling them to return later. Backlogs have become especially bad in recent months at crossings in California, Arizona and Texas, with some people waiting five weeks to try to claim asylum at San Diego's main crossing.

In 2017, the U.S. fielded more than 330,000 asylum claims, nearly double the number two years earlier and surpassing Germany as highest in the world.

It's unclear how many people en route to the U.S. will even make it to the border. About 4,800 migrants are sheltered in a sports complex in Mexico City, some 600 miles (965 kilometers) from the U.S. border. Several smaller groups were trailing hundreds of miles to the south; officials estimated about 7,000 in all were in the country in the caravans. The migrants are largely poor people and many say they're fleeing violence; more than 1,700 were children under 18, and more than 300 were children under age 5.

Similar caravans have gathered regularly over the years and have generally dwindled by the time they reach the southern border. Most have passed largely unnoticed.

Associated Press writers Elliot Spagat in San Diego and Jill Colvin in Washington contributed to this report.

Copyright 2018 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.</s>WASHINGTON (AP) - The Latest on President Donald Trump and immigration (all times local):

The American Civil Liberties Union has filed a legal challenge to President Donald Trump's order denying asylum to migrants if they cross the U.S.-Mexico border illegally.

The lawsuit was filed Friday in federal court in San Francisco and argues the new rules are against the law. Attorney Lee Gelernt says the regulations will put families in danger.

The suit seeks to declare the regulations invalid and want a judge to stop rules from going into effect while the litigation is pending.

The new rules were spurred in part by caravans of Central American migrants slowly moving north on foot, but officials say they will apply to anyone caught crossing illegally. Officials say about 70,000 people who enter the country illegally claim asylum.

The order invoked the same national security powers Trump used to push through his travel ban.

President Donald Trump says he hopes a legal battle over an Obama-era program shielding young immigrants from deportation goes to the Supreme Court.

A three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday decided to keep in place an injunction blocking Trump's decision to phase out the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, or DACA.

Lawsuits by California and others challenging the Trump administration's decision will continue in federal court while the injunction remains in place.

DACA has protected 700,000 people who were brought to the U.S. illegally as children or came with families that overstayed visas.

The Trump administration has said it moved last year to end DACA because Texas and other states threatened to sue, raising the prospect of a chaotic end to the program.

President Donald Trump has signed a proclamation to deny asylum to migrants who enter the United States illegally through the U.S.-Mexico border.

Trump invoked the same national security powers he used to push his travel ban through. He says he wants people to come to the U.S. legally.

The move on Friday was spurred in part by caravans of Central American migrants slowly moving north on foot, but officials say it will apply to anyone caught crossing illegally.

Officials say the measure is meant to funnel asylum seekers through official border crossings for speedy rulings instead of having them try to circumvent such crossings on the nearly 2,000-mile (3,200-kilometer) stretch.

The busy ports of entry already have long lines and waits, forcing immigration officials to tell some migrants to return to make their claims.

Trump's proclamation puts into practice regulations adopted by immigration officials on Thursday.

The Trump administration says it will deny asylum to migrants who enter the country illegally. The administration is invoking extraordinary presidential national security powers to tighten the border as caravans of Central Americans slowly approach the United States.

The measures are meant to funnel asylum seekers through official border crossings for speedy rulings, officials said, instead of having them try to circumvent such crossings on the nearly 2,000-mile (3,200-kilometer) border. But the busy ports of entry already have long lines and waits, forcing immigration officials to tell some migrants to come back to make their claims.

The move was spurred in part by caravans of Central American migrants slowly moving north on foot, but officials say it will apply to anyone caught crossing illegally.</s>The United States will no longer allow people who enter the country illegally to claim asylum, officials said Thursday, unveiling a controversial new crackdown on immigration.

The restriction on asylum claims will seek to address what a senior administration official called the "historically unparalleled abuse of our immigration system" along the border with Mexico.

The new rule was published by the Department of Homeland Security and is expected to get President Donald Trump's signature shortly -- as well as face court challenges.

The American Civil Liberties Union said that the right to request asylum must be granted to anyone entering the country, regardless of where they were.

"US law specifically allows individuals to apply for asylum whether or not they are at a port of entry. It is illegal to circumvent that by agency or presidential decree," the ACLU said.

But according to the new rule, Trump has authority to restrict illegal immigration "if he determines it to be in the national interest."

Trump's administration argues that he has the executive power to curb immigration in the name of national security, a power he invoked right after taking office with a controversial ban on travelers from several mostly-Muslim countries -- whose final version was upheld by the US Supreme Court on June 26 after a protracted legal battle.

"Today's rule applies this important principle to aliens who violate such a suspension or restriction regarding the southern border," Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen and acting attorney general Matthew Whitaker said.

Those seeking political or other kinds of asylum -- nearly all of them coming from impoverished and violent crime-plagued countries of Central America -- will be heard exclusively at the border crossings, administration officials told journalists.

This is expected to put a dent in those streaming into an already overburdened system, officials said, noting that there is a backlog of more than 700,000 cases in the immigration courts.

Many politicians on both sides of the aisle agree that the US immigration system is hugely inefficient and unable to cope with demand. However, Trump's focus on the issue during campaigning for Tuesday's hotly contested midterm congressional elections was criticized as veering into immigrant-bashing and even racism.

In speeches and on Twitter, Trump hammered away nearly daily at "caravans" of a few thousand impoverished Central Americans that periodically attempt to walk up through Mexico and then gain entry to the United States.

He called a current caravan, which is still hundreds of miles from the US border and dwindling in numbers, an "invasion" and said it would bring hardened criminals to US streets.

Administration officials say that aside from the rhetoric the border really does have a problem, given that anyone who manages to get across can request asylum and subsequently often vanish while their case sits in the court system.

"The vast majority of these applications eventually turn out to be non-meritorious," a senior administration official said, asking not to be identified.

Less than 10 percent of cases result in asylum being granted, the government says.

Human rights campaigners and other critics of the Trump crackdown say that by restricting asylum seekers to the narrow border crossing points -- which are already under enormous pressure -- the government is effectively shutting the door on people who may truly be fleeing for their lives.

But the administration official argued that "what we're attempting to do is trying to funnel credible fear claims, or asylum claims, through the ports of entry where we are better resourced."

That way, he said, courts will "handle those claims in an expeditious and efficient manner, so that those who do actually require an asylum protection get those protections."

In 2018, border patrols have registered more than 400,000 illegal border crossers, homeland security said. And in the last five years, the number of those requesting asylum has increased by 2,000 percent, it said.</s>The Trump administration announced new measures Thursday that would deny asylum to migrants who enter the country illegally, invoking emergency national security powers to curb long-standing humanitarian protections for foreigners who arrive on American soil.

The restrictions rely on authorities invoked by the president to implement his "travel ban" in early 2017, according to senior administration officials who briefed reporters on the measures.

"Those who enter the country between ports are knowingly and voluntarily breaking the law," said one official. "So while immigration laws afford people various forms of protection, there's a violation of federal law in the manner these illegal aliens are entering the country."

President Donald Trump is preparing issue a proclamation to assert the emergency powers, and the rule changes will be published Friday in the Federal Register, the officials said.

Legal challenges are expected to follow soon after. Immigration advocacy groups insist U.S. laws clearly extend asylum protections to anyone who reaches the United States, no matter how they enter the country.

But the asylum restrictions are the latest attempts by the administration to assert executive powers to restrict immigrants and foreigners from entering the United States. And with an estimated 7,000 to 10,000 Central Americans moving north through Mexico in caravan groups, Trump has been demanding new tools to stop them at the border.

Privately, Homeland Security officials acknowledge the new restrictions, at least on their own, are unlikely to achieve the kind of immediate deterrent effect the White House desires.

Detention capacity at U.S. immigration jails already nearly maxxed out, and court-imposed limits on the government's ability to hold children in immigration jails for longer than 20 days mean most migrant families who arrive seeking protection are still likely to be released pending a hearing.

Under U.S. immigration laws, foreigners who arrive on American soil stating a fear of return can request asylum as a shield against deportation. A U.S. asylum officer then conducts an interview to determine if the person has a "credible fear" of persecution, in which case the applicant is typically assigned a court date and released from custody.

Soaring numbers of migrants have entered the United States taking this administrative path in recent years, often crossing illegally to turn themselves in to U.S. border agents. Since 2014, asylum claims at the border have increased fourfold, adding to a backlog of more than 750,000 pending cases in U.S. immigration courts.

The new measures under preparation would continue to allow foreigners to request asylum if they enter the country legally at U.S. ports of entry, but not those who cross without authorization, administration officials said.

With so many asylum seekers arriving at border crossings, U.S. customs officers have been limiting the number of people allowed to approach the pedestrian entry lanes, a tactic known as "metering" that has triggered challenges in federal court.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection officials defend the practice on the grounds that the border crossings are not equipped to process hundreds of asylum seekers daily, and officers must continue to facilitate ordinary cross-border travel and trade while protecting the country from terrorists and drug runners.

It is unclear how many of the migrants traveling in the caravans will approach the ports of entry and attempt to enter legally. In recent weeks the wait at some crossings has stretched to several days or more, and in Tijuana the list of asylum seekers has grown to more than 1,000 people.

Those delays increase the chances that caravan members could attempt to cross illegally by fording the Rio Grande or trekking through the desert to set foot on U.S. soil and surrender to Border Patrol agents.

Under the proposed rule changes, migrants who cross illegally would be ineligible for asylum, but they could still be spared from deportation by qualifying for a lesser status known as "withholding of removal."

That status does not give foreigners a path to a green card or citizenship, and instead functions as a kind of provisional suspension of the deportation process, revocable at any time. Nonetheless, it would still give those who cross illegally a way to get into the immigration court backlog and released from custody, especially those who are traveling with children.

"Congress very specifically said you can apply for asylum if you arrive in the United States regardless of whether you're at a port of entry," said Omar Jadwat, director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Immigrants' Rights Project. "They clearly and explicitly meant to make asylum available to anyone who reaches the United States.

"We do this because of our obligations under international law and who we are as a country, and what we understand our role to be in terms of protecting people fleeing persecution," added Jadwat, who said ACLU attorneys have been anticipating the measures and reviewing legal options. "If the president doesn't like what the law says, the way to address it is to get Congress to pass a new one."

Separately on Thursday, a federal appeals court in California ruled that Trump cannot immediately end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program that shields from deportation young immigrants brought to the country illegally as children.

The unanimous decision by a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit increases the likelihood that the fate of nearly 700,000 "dreamers" will be settled by the Supreme Court.

Trump said he would allow the program to expire, after Texas and other states threatened to sue to force an end to protections.

An early draft of the proposal reviewed by The Washington Post asserted the president can use his authority under Section 212(f) of the Immigration and Nationality Act to declare certain migrants ineligible for asylum for national security grounds.

The section is the same legal authority Trump asserted to bar foreigners from certain Muslim-majority countries from coming to the United States under the "travel ban" in early 2017.

The ban drew multiple legal challenges and forced the administration to issue three different versions before a revised ban was upheld in June by the Supreme Court on a 5 to 4 vote.

The Washington Post's Maria Sacchetti and Robert Barnes contributed to this report.</s>The Trump administration took a major step on Thursday to restrict asylum claims by migrants, putting forward a regulation that would make individuals ineligible for asylum if they cross the U.S. southern border illegally.

Once the plan goes into full effect, which is expected to happen in coming days, migrants entering at the U.S. southern border would only be eligible for asylum if they come to official ports of entry.

"What we are attempting to do is trying to funnel ... asylum claims through the ports of entry where we are better resourced, have better capabilities and better manpower and staffing to actually handle those claims in an expeditious and efficient manner," a senior administration official told reporters in a news briefing on Thursday, on condition of anonymity.

The plan is the Trump administration's latest move to limit the eligibility of migrants for asylum in the United States.

The regulation would largely affect migrants from Central America's Northern Triangle - Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador - who cross the U.S. border with Mexico to flee violence and poverty in their home countries.

"The vast majority of aliens who enter illegally today come from the Northern Triangle countries, and large portions of those aliens assert a credible fear," the regulation's text says. "Channeling those aliens to ports of entry would encourage these aliens to first avail themselves of offers of asylum from Mexico."

"U.S. law specifically allows individuals to apply for asylum whether or not they are at a port of entry," said Omar Jadwat, director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Immigrants' Rights Project. "It is illegal to circumvent that by agency or presidential decree."</s>WASHINGTON - US President Donald Trump said Friday he has signed an immigration proclamation, an order that would help effectively ban migrants who cross the U.S. border with Mexico illegally from qualifying for asylum.

The Trump administration unveiled new rules on Thursday to sharply limit migrant asylum claims by barring individuals who cross the US southern border illegally from seeking asylum. People have to come into the United States at points of entry, Trump said before leaving for Paris.

“We need people in our country but they have to come in legally and they have to have merit,” Trump said. The plan, which invokes the same authority Trump used to justify his travel ban on citizens of several Muslim-majority nations, is likely to be quickly challenged in court. The Trump administration lost a court bid on Thursday, when a federal appeals court in California ruled that it must continue a program begun under former President Barack Obama that protects hundreds of thousands of illegal immigrants who were brought into the country as children, known as Dreamers.

Trump said the ruling on the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program was good news because now the administration can appeal the case to the US Supreme Court. The measures are meant to funnel asylum seekers through official border crossings for speedy rulings, officials said, instead of having them try to circumvent such crossings on the nearly 3200-kilometre border.

But the busy ports of entry already have long lines and waits, forcing immigration officials to tell some migrants to turn around and come back to make their claims.

The move was spurred in part by caravans of Central American migrants slowly moving north on foot but will apply to anyone caught crossing illegally, officials said on Thursday. It’s unknown whether those in the caravan, many fleeing violence in their homeland, plan to cross illegally.

Administration officials said those denied asylum under the proclamation may be eligible for similar forms of protection if they fear returning to their countries, though they would be subject to a tougher threshold. Those forms of protection include “withholding of removal” — which is similar to asylum, but doesn’t allow for green cards or bringing families — or asylum under the United Nations Convention Against Torture.

The announcement was the latest push to enforce Mr Trump’s hard line stance on immigration through regulatory changes and presidential orders, bypassing Congress. But those efforts have been largely thwarted by legal challenges and, in the case of family separations this year, stymied by a global outcry that prompted Trump to scrap them.

The new changes were likely to be met with legal challenges, too. Omar Jadwat, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s Immigrants’ Rights Project, said on Thursday they were clearly illegal. “US law specifically allows individuals to apply for asylum whether or not they are at a port of entry. It is illegal to circumvent that by agency or presidential decree,” he said.

Curbing immigration has been a signature issue for Mr Trump, who pushed it hard in the days leading up to Tuesday’s midterm elections, railing against the caravans that are still hundreds of kilometres from the border. He has made little mention of the issue since the election but has sent troops to the border in response.

As of Thursday, there are more than 5600 US troops deployed to the border mission, with about 550 actually working on the border in Texas. The military is expected to have the vast majority of the more than 7000 troops planned for the mission deployed by Monday, and that number could grow.

Trump also suggested he’d revoke the right to citizenship for babies born to non-US citizens on American soil and erect massive “tent cities” to detain migrants. Those issues were not addressed by the regulations on Thursday. The administration has long said immigration officials are drowning in asylum cases partly because people falsely claim asylum and then live in the US. with work permits.

The asylum section of the Immigration and Nationality Act says a migrant is allowed to make a claim up to a year after arriving in the US, and it doesn’t matter how they arrive — illegally or through a border crossing. Migrants who cross illegally are generally arrested and often seek asylum or some other form of protection. Claims have spiked in recent years, and there is a backlog of more than 800,000 cases pending in immigration court. Generally, only about 20 per cent of applicants are approved.

Trump has long said those seeking asylum should come through legal ports of entry. But many migrants are unaware of that guidance, and official border crossings have grown clogged. Officials have turned away asylum seekers at border crossings because of overcrowding, telling them to return later. Backlogs have become especially bad in recent months at crossings in California, Arizona and Texas, with some people waiting five weeks to try to claim asylum at San Diego’s main crossing.</s>
• The Trump administration on Thursday took its first steps toward restricting asylum to immigrants who cross the border into the United States illegally.
• The changes are coming as multiple caravans of thousands of Central American migrants make their way to the US through Mexico.
• Many of them have said they intend to request asylum.
• Immigration and civil liberties advocates have repeatedly said that the Trump administration’s efforts will contravene domestic and international law, which allow migrants to seek asylum no matter how they enter.

The Trump administration on Thursday made its first move toward barring asylum to immigrants who cross the border illegally, as President Donald Trump has been promising for weeks ahead of a slow-moving caravan of Central American migrants traveling to the United States.

The Department of Homeland Security on Thursday released documents outlining the new restrictions, which are set to be published to the Federal Register on Friday morning. The documents say that the changes won’t take effect until Trump issues a proclamation. “Consistent with our immigration laws, the President has the broad authority to suspend or restrict the entry of aliens into the United States if he determines it to be in the national interest to do so,” Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen and Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker said in a joint statement announcing the changes.

They added: “Today, we are using the authority granted to us by Congress to bar aliens who violate a Presidential suspension of entry or other restriction from asylum eligibility.”

The changes come as multiple caravans of thousands of migrants remain in Mexico, grappling over what route to take to the US-Mexico border. Many of the caravan members have said they intend to seek asylum in the US, though it’s unclear whether they plan to request it after crossing the border illegally or after reaching a legal port of entry.

Immigration and civil liberties advocates have repeatedly said the Trump administration’s efforts will contravene domestic and international law, which allow migrants to seek asylum no matter how they enter.

“US law specifically allows individuals to apply for asylum whether or not they are at a port of entry. It is illegal to circumvent that by agency or presidential decree,” Omar Jadwat of the American Civil Liberties Union said Thursday in a statement.

Read more: Trump rages against migrant caravans in long, bizarre press conference, vows to bar asylum claims from people who cross the border illegally

In a briefing with reporters Thursday afternoon, senior administration officials said the changes were an attempt to “funnel” credible asylum claims through the ports of entry, where border officials would be better equipped to handle the volume.

The senior administration officials also called the current asylum system – which is currently backlogged with roughly 800,000 cases – a “full-fledged and very large crisis.”

They argued that the changes would reduce the amount of illegitimate asylum claims, paving the way for legitimate asylum-seekers to get a fair hearing.

“It’s important just to remind people that those who enter between the ports of entry are knowingly and voluntarily breaking the law. It’s a federal crime. People can and do go to jail for that every single day,” one official said. “While immigration laws do afford people various forms of protection, the reality is that it’s a violation of federal law in the manner that these illegal aliens are entering the country.”
The American Civil Liberties Union files a lawsuit in response to President Trump's proclamation that denies asylum to immigrants who enter the country illegally.