Local immigration lawyer explains migrant asylum policy
U.S. Customs and Border Patrol Agents fired tear gas at hundreds of people — including women and children after some of them tried to force their way across the border between San Diego and Tijuana, Mexico.
The chaos at the border has stemmed from growing tension and confusion among migrants, specifically on the policy on entering and seeking asylum in the United States. The border terminal can only process about a hundred asylum seekers per day.
Coachella Valley immigration lawyer Michael Harrington has taken on similar immigrants cases. He says many times people are escaping religious or political persecution or death.
“Being sent back to one’s country they’re fleeing from often can result, for many, in death,” Harrington said.
Harrington says migrants can ask for asylum at the border by speaking with an asylum officer or border agent. Migrants can be granted asylum if they can prove a legitimate threat at their home country and need for asylum.
“The procedure is actually to ask for asylum. That’s a verbal presentation explaining a credible threat and need to leave the country, and depending on well-informed that individual is, is going to determine how they can articulate the facts to make a case for asylum,” Harrington said.
“It’s very difficult to reach people because of the confusion and panic,” he said. Harrington addressed a need for humanitarian aide workers and translators to assist with the process at the border.
According to the American Immigration Council, there’s more than 300,000 affirmative asylum applications pending with the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services as of March 2018.
Watch Sarah Trott on KESQ at 6 p.m. with the full story and one man’s journey toward citizenship.
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