Ilhan Omar slams Biden administration’s new asylum law that fails ‘basic morality’
Virginia Aabram
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Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) has joined the growing chorus of Democratic voices opposing a Biden administration initiative to deter asylum-seekers from entering the United States through the southern border.
Omar, once a Somalian refugee, slammed the guidance, which bears similarity to former President Donald Trump’s handling of the border. The rule would take effect after Title 42, which allowed more immigrants to be turned away due to the coronavirus pandemic, is lifted in late spring.
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“The Biden Administration’s proposed rule would prohibit any migrants from applying for asylum in the United States unless they have already been turned away from asylum in another country. It is, in word and deed, almost identical to Donald Trump’s ‘transit ban'” Omar said in a statement.
“Just as I vocally criticized this policy when Donald Trump proposed it, I must do the same when it is proposed by a Democratic president. The policy flies in the face of international law, U.S. law and basic morality. It will put the lives of countless asylum-seekers at risk. By punishing the victims of decades of failed policy, it will do absolutely nothing to address the root causes of U.S. immigration,” she added.
She continued, “The victims of this policy will be the innocent—people who committed no crime other than daring to seek a better life in the United States of America. I know. Because I was one of them.”
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The 153-page proposed regulation announced Tuesday is part of a series of new initiatives by President Joe Biden to slow the number of immigrants and asylum-seekers crossing the U.S.-Mexico border. The administration is putting it in “anticipation of a potential surge of migrants at the southwest border” after the Title 42 pandemic border policy is expected to be lifted.
Omar was born in Somalia, and she and her family spent four years in a refugee camp in Kenya after they fled the Somali Civil War. She came to the U.S. in 1995.