JACUMBA HOT SPRINGS, CALIFORNIA - FEBRUARY 20: Border patrol agents process asylum seekers at an improvised camp near the US-Mexico border on February 20, 2024 in Jacumba Hot Springs, California. (Qian Weizhong/VCG via Getty Images)
The New York Post reported that a memo sent out by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) principal legal advisor Kerry Doyle in 2022 told agency prosecutors to dismiss cases for migrants who do not pose a threat to national security.
TRAC’s data shows that in the same year, there were 173,227 applications for asylum filed. Of those applications, immigration judges ordered 36,250 of the applicants be removed from the U.S., granted asylum to 31,859 applicants. The other 102,550 applications were reportedly dismissed or taken off the books.
In 2023, there were 248,232 asylum applications filed, of which 52,440 applicants were ordered to be removed, 43,113 were granted asylum, and 149,305 were dismissed or taken off the books.
June 2, 2022: ICE agents conduct an enforcement operation in the U.S. interior. ((Immigration and Customs Enforcement))
The applicants whose cases are dismissed are able to apply for asylum again or they can seek out other forms of legal status like a family-based or employment-based visa, or even Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA).
The immigration court backlog has grown from 2.8 million at the end of Fiscal Year 2023 to nearly 3.6 million in FY 2024, with immigration judges being unable to keep up with the current flow of new cases into the system.
The number of new cases filed as well as the number of cases completed by immigration judges are both on pace to exceed all-time highs this year, the TRAC report notes, though the pace of completions will be unable to stem the growing backlog.
TOPSHOT - US President Joe Biden speaks with US Customs and Border Protection officers as he visits the US-Mexico border in El Paso, Texas, on January 8, 2023. (JIM WATSON/AFP via Getty Images)
The president has been weighing additional executive action since the collapse of a bipartisan border bill earlier this year. The number of illegal crossings at the U.S.-Mexico border has declined for months, partly because of a stepped-up effort by Mexico. Still, immigration remains a top concern heading into the U.S. presidential election in November and Republicans are eager to hammer Biden on the issue.
The Democratic administration’s effort would aim to head off any potential spike in crossings that could occur later in the year, as the fall election draws closer, when the weather cools and numbers tend to rise. Four people familiar with Biden’s plans were not authorized to speak publicly about the ongoing discussions and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.
The move would allow Biden, whose administration has taken smaller steps in recent weeks to discourage migration and speed up asylum processing, to say he has done all he can do to control the border numbers without help from Congress.
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The restrictions being considered are an aggressive attempt to ease the nation's overwhelmed asylum system, along with a new effort to speed up the cases of migrants already in America and another meant to quicken processing for migrants with criminal records or those who would otherwise be eventually deemed ineligible for asylum in the United States.
The people told the AP that the administration was weighing some of the policies directly from a stalled bipartisan Senate border deal, including capping the number of encounters at an average of 4,000 per day over a week and whether that limit would include asylum-seekers coming to the border with appointments through U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s CBP One app. Right now, there are roughly 1,450 such appointments per day.
Fox News Digital’s Michael Lee and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Greg Wehner is a breaking news reporter for Fox News Digital.
Story tips and can be sent to Greg.Wehner@Fox.com and on Twitter @GregWehner.
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