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Trump put hundreds of thousands of asylum cases in jeopardy with new rule

Aurora and her six-year-old daughter, who were detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement and sent to a family detention center in Texas, hold hands as they pose for a portrait during an interview with Reuters in the Central Valley of California, U.S., July 23, 2026. U.S. immigration officials have arrested more than 12,000 people following tips shared by the Office of Refugee Resettlement, the agency that houses unaccompanied migrant children, since the start of Donald Trump’s presidency, according to internal data reviewed by Reuters. REUTERS/Carlos Barria

María Teresita Armstrong-Matta
July 28, 2026

The Trump administration implemented a new rule that impacts approximately 444,724 pending asylum cases.

According to the Washington Post, nearly one-third of the 1.4 million USCIS backlog will now be directly sent to Justice Department immigration judges without prior public input.

The rule enables judges to dismiss cases without hearings and potentially remove asylum seekers from the country without opportunity to present their claims.

Immigration attorney Ira Kurzban characterized the move as part of a strategy to "take legal people and make them illegal."

“At a 30,000-foot level it sure looks like a deportation machine,” he added.

The rule particularly targets asylum seekers who filed more than a year after arriving, exploiting technical filing deadlines that judges can normally waive.

Immigration courts provide no public defenders, leaving vulnerable asylum applicants from persecution unable to navigate U.S. procedures.

The rule also coincides with terminating Temporary Protected Status for Haitians and Syrians, exposing both groups to simultaneous deportation threats.

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