The state of Texas is suing the Biden administration to try to throw out a newly introduced asylum rule, saying a phone app migrants use to set up appointments at the border to seek entry to the United States is encouraging illegal immigration.
The lawsuit filed Tuesday is the latest legal salvo attacking several aspects of the administration’s plan to manage migration after the end of a key pandemic-era immigration regulation called Title 42.
In the lawsuit, Texas argues that the asylum rule encourages the use of a cellphone app, called CBP One, for migrants who lack the proper documentation to make an appointment to come to a port of entry and search entry into the United States.
Texas argues that the Biden administration is encouraging people to come to the US even though they have no legal basis to stay.
“The Biden administration deliberately designed this phone app with the goal of illegally approving more aliens to enter the country and go wherever they want once they arrive,” Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said in a press release.
The complaint was filed in the Western District of Texas.
While the lawsuit focuses on the phone application, it seeks to eliminate the entire asylum rule, called Circumvention. The rule went into effect when Title 42 expired on May 11. The rule makes it extremely difficult for migrants traveling to the southern border to get asylum if they don’t seek protection in a country they passed through before coming to the US or apply online through the application.
The use of the app is a key part of the administration’s plans to create a more streamlined system at the border where migrants make appointments in advance, but when the app launched in January it was criticized for problems technological and because the demand has had a long time. exceeded the available spaces. Migrants can make appointments for specific ports of entry, five of which are in Texas.
Texas argues that under federal law, people who enter the country illegally, with rare exceptions, should be deported, but that the enforcement does not check whether migrants seeking appointments could qualify for exceptions. So, the state argues, the Biden administration’s use of the application essentially encourages people to come to the US even if they don’t qualify. Texas also argues that it must pay the financial burden of migrants coming to the US through things like health care or education.
The new asylum rule has also been attacked by rights groups who argue that the US has an obligation to offer asylum to those in desperate need. They are also asking for the rule to be removed. Texas is also part of another lawsuit that accuses the administration of overstepping its authority by allowing up to 360,000 people a year from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela to enter the US under its humanitarian parole authority .
