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Former Acting ICE Director Thomas Homan sounds off on 'America Reports' as President Biden considers Trump-like rule.
President Biden and the Department of Homeland Security's forthcoming policy limiting asylum claims at the southern border was ripped by one top ex-immigration official as a disingenuous development rife with exceptions that will lead to more "asylum fraud."
Former Acting ICE Director Thomas Homan told Fox News the proposed rule – which would largely make migrants presumed ineligible for asylum if they failed to claim such protections in a prior country through which they traveled – may look similar to ex-President Trump's third-country and "Remain in Mexico" policies. Instead, he argued, it is full of holes.
"I do think when someone claims asylum and let's say that their claim asylum from Honduras because their fear, or they have a fear of persecution from their home government -- that's what asylum is," Homan told "America Reports."
"So they get to Mexico. Have they not escaped that fear of persecution from their own government? Of course. They should claim asylum in the first free country they come to. I believe in that."
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US President Joe Biden speaks with a member of the US Border Patrol as they walk along the US-Mexico border fence in El Paso, Texas, on January 8, 2023. (JIM WATSON/AFP via Getty Image)
"But this administration – look, this is smoke and mirrors again. They're going to establish rules, but there are so many exceptions to the rule that the exception is going to swallow the rule."
Unaccompanied children would be exempt from the rule, and there would be other factors that could rebut the presumption, including an acute medical emergency, being a trafficking victim, and facing an "extreme and imminent" threat to life or safety. But all others would be presumed to be ineligible and therefore removable.
"They just got to come to the border saying, well, I fear for my life. And how do we just prove that they fear for their life? So there's going to be so many exceptions to this rule, it is not going to matter," said Homan.
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Tom Homan, deputy director of U.S. Immigration & Customs Enforcement (ICE), speaks during a press conference with Jeff Sessions, U.S. attorney general, not pictured, regarding immigration policy in San Diego, California, U.S., on Monday, May 7, 2018. President Donald Trump renewed a threat to close down the federal government when current funding runs out in September if immigration reforms and funding for a wall on the U.S. border with Mexico aren't forthcoming. Photographer: Ariana Drehsler/Bloomberg via Getty Images (Ariana Drehsler/Bloomberg)
Homan said Biden should simply reinstate the Trump's "Remain In Mexico" policy as-enforced under the prior administration.
Biden knows he will lose any litigation brought against the new rule, Homan surmised, as the administration has in prior executive actions like the eviction moratorium on U.S. renters the Supreme Court shut down last year.
"And here's your game when they lose in court. They can say, well, we were solving the border crisis numbers going down. Republican states came in and sued us. Now the numbers are going back up. This is the game they're playing," he said.
"The policies they're creating are unlawful. They won't work, but they're ignoring the policies that did work under the Trump administration."
Of Senate Democrats who are blasting Biden over the rule, Homan said the lawmakers want fully open borders and do not care who comes into the country.
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"Immigration court data says yes, 9 out of 10 people who claim asylum at our border never get relief from U.S. courts because either [they] don't show up, they don't qualify. Nine out of 10. That means millions of these asylum seekers are going to be ordered removed," he said.
"So the Democrats want to pick a side in this issue. Look at the facts. The facts are 9 out of 10 commit asylum fraud. They don't qualify. They're clogging up the system for thousands of people around the world that really are escaping fear and persecution and need the United States' assistance."
Fox News' Adam Shaw contributed to this report.
