The Biden administration is considering forcing some migrant families entering the country without permission to stay close to the border in Texas

Can we just list the border states then? or possibly other states pending asylum screening

effectively limiting their ability to travel within the US, three US officials told The Times.

Government officials have been considering the idea as a way to halt the recent increase in the number of migrant families crossing the southern border, which reportedly reached an all-time high last month. Proponents of the “remain in Texas” idea, which has yet to be finalized, hope it will help the government achieve its goals of quickly deporting families that fail initial asylum screening and deterring other families from moving in the first place. to cross the border.

But the proposal, which recalls President Reagan’s attempts to restrict asylum seekers’ movements in the late 1980s, is likely to meet fierce opposition from immigrant rights groups and border state officials. Since 2022, Texas Governor Greg Abbott, a Republican, has transported thousands of migrants from his state to Democratic-led cities like Los Angeles, New York, and Washington, D.C.

The Biden plan would force certain migrant families to stay in Texas

or possibly other border states

by tracking their location through GPS monitoring devices, such as ankle bracelets, said the three officials, who were not authorized to speak publicly on the matter. The families would undergo an asylum screening process to determine if they could stay in the US and file their claims. Officials have discussed working with local organizations to provide housing for the families.

If the families fail the initial screening, they would be easier to deport because they would be close to the border.

Migrant families are generally more difficult to apprehend in the U.S. interior because of the complex logistical planning required to apprehend children and their parents. Deportations of migrant families are historically lower than those of single adults seeking asylum in the US

Department of Homeland Security DHS

Officials have talked about targeting Central American families in the program because these are countries where the US can deport significant numbers of people.

“DHS has ongoing policy and operational discussions about how we can leverage our authorities to ensure a fair, humane and effective immigration process that efficiently removes those who have no legal basis to remain in the country,” said a spokesperson. of the Department of Homeland Security. If implemented,

the plan would mark the latest expansion of a Biden administration program known as Family Expedited Removal Management, which imposes curfews and GPS monitoring on migrant families traveling to major cities, including Los Angeles, San Francisco and Washington, D.C.

Government officials had hoped that the FERM program, along with videos and press releases depicting families being deported, would help deter even more families from entering the US without authorization.

However, in July, Border Patrol encountered more than 60,000 families crossing the border, nearly half the number crossing the southern border that month. Border Patrol has yet to release that number for August, but the Washington Post reported last week that it was well over 91,000, an all-time record.

Families are responsible for much of the overall increase in border crossings since May, when state officials believed Biden’s new asylum limits had finally put a dent in border crossings.

The Biden administration’s treatment of migrant families has been criticized by immigrant advocates, who say the families do not have reasonable access to lawyers or time to prepare their asylum cases.

Families are being rushed out of their homes within weeks of arriving in the United States, without a fair chance to present their case, and often without understanding the procedures unfolding around them, the National Immigrant Justice Center wrote. week in a policy letter quashing the curfew program. .

Robyn Barnard, director of refugee advocacy at Human Rights First, said they will remain in Texas

proposal

what misplaced.

“People should not be penalized for the way they come in to seek asylum,” she said.

US officials have long implored migrants to enter the US only through legal avenues. This includes making arrangements at a port of entry or applying for a program that allows certain migrants to come to the US if they have a financial sponsor and can pass security checks.

“People who do not use available legal routes to enter the US now face harsher consequences, including a minimum five-year ban on repatriation.

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entry and possible criminal prosecution,” Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro N. Mayorkas said in May.

But the administration has so far refused to revive Trump

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and the Obama-era practice of detaining migrant families at the border.

We have no plan to detain families, Mayorkas said in April. As I said, we will use alternatives to detention, including some innovations in that regard, and we will use improved alternatives to detention as warranted on a case-by-case basis.

The idea of ​​forcing migrant families to stay close to the border hasn’t been tried for decades, said Yael Schacher, Americas and Europe director at Refugees International and a historian of US immigration.

“There has been no attempt to force asylum-seeking families to stay in border towns for 35 years,” she said.

In the late 1980s, the

n chairman Ronald

Reagan

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The government forced thousands of migrants to apply for asylum near where they crossed the border into South Texas and receive their decision there. Officials were clear at the time that the policy was designed to deter families from crossing the border.

“Initially, we may see a slightly higher number of aliens in the area, but that will quickly diminish once word gets back to Central America,” an immigration official told the Associated Press at the time.

The migrants lived in church shelters or set up camps in parking lots or abandoned buildings awaiting their first asylum interviews. “It is clear that these people are experiencing difficulties and hardships,” a visiting UN official told the AP.

Local officials even indignantly tried to evict federal immigration officials from the office they used to process asylum applications. At one point, a Texas state judge banned federal officials from operating their office in the southern Texas town of Harlingen.

In early 1989, a federal judge ordered immigration officials to allow migrants to leave South Texas while he decided how to rule on the new policy, and the camps began to empty.

While the migrants waited to be processed so they could go elsewhere in the US, Texans stepped in to feed them. I think we fed four or five hundred of them, Dolores Muniz, a volunteer, told J. Michael Kennedy of The Times in January 1989. It is our duty as Americans. This country was founded by immigrants. The Statue of Liberty says to bring them in.