Migrants seeking asylum from Central America sit next to a vehicle stopped by police after crossing the Rio Grande into Eagle Pass, Texas from Mexico along Highway 90, in Hondo, Texas, U.S., May 1 6 year 2022.
Shannon Stapleton | Reuters
The Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday upholding a controversial Trump-era rule that allowed Customs and Border Protection officials to deport migrants at the US southern border as a health measure. public in response to the pandemic.
Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts temporarily blocked the Biden administration earlier this month from ending the controversial policy, known as Title 42.
More than 2 million people have been deported at the southern border under the policy since 2020.
In November, a federal district court in DC ordered the Department of Homeland Security to end the policy on December 21, criticizing the evictions as arbitrary. But Republican-led states have intervened in the case and successfully filed a petition with the Supreme Court last week to block the lower court’s ruling.
The deportation policy originated with the Trump administration. In March 2020, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention used a provision in the Public Health Services Act, or Title 42, to bar migrants from Mexico or Canada from entering the United States due to the risk of the disease. their chance of spreading Covid. The eviction policy is often referred to simply as Title 42.
But human rights groups and dozens of health experts have fiercely criticized the policy as a way for the federal government to carry out arbitrary mass deportations at the southern US border under the guise of medical care. public.
The Biden administration continued this policy until April 2022, when the CDC said it would take longer to contain the spread of Covid. The CDC and DHS had planned for the policy to end in May, but the Republican states sued and were ordered by federal court in Louisiana to prevent the Biden administration from ending the deportations at that time.
Republicans and some Democrats argue that ending the policy will lead to a massive increase in migration at the southern border that communities there can’t afford to cope with. El Paso, Texas declared a state of emergency on Saturday in response to the recent surge in migrants crossing the border.
