The Trump administration is developing a regulation that would allow U.S. immigration officers to reject some asylum applications without first interviewing the applicants, a major procedural shift that could speed up denials and send more migrants directly into deportation proceedings, according to a new report.
The plan, first detailed by CBS News, would give U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) officers authority to deny asylum applications on the written record if they determine the claims were filed more than one year after the applicant arrived in the United States.
Under the current system, USCIS has traditionally interviewed nearly all affirmative asylum applicants before deciding whether to approve, deny, or refer their cases to immigration court. The proposed change would focus on the one-year filing deadline, one of the most consequential technical barriers in U.S. asylum law.
Federal law generally requires people seeking asylum to file within one year of arriving in the country, but it also allows exceptions for changed or extraordinary circumstances. Those can include serious medical issues, ineffective legal counsel, changes in country conditions, or other factors that explain why an applicant missed the deadline.
The outlet noted that the internal documents say USCIS officers could still schedule interviews when they believe an applicant may qualify for one of those exceptions. But cases that appear deficient on paper could be rejected without an interview and sent to the Justice Department's immigration court system, where migrants would have to argue their claims in a more adversarial setting.
A USCIS spokesperson told CBS News the administration is "considering multiple options" to address what officials described as a backlog of more than 1 million asylum claims. The spokesperson said sending "deficient" applications to immigration court would prevent USCIS from spending time on cases it would otherwise refer anyway, while still allowing applicants to present claims before a judge.
Immigration advocates warned the change could have sweeping consequences for people navigating one of the most complicated areas of U.S. law, often without attorneys. Conchita Cruz, co-executive director of the Asylum Seeker Advocacy Project, told the outlet the rule could "wrongfully" place applicants in deportation proceedings before they have a chance to explain why they filed late.
The legal stakes are high as asylum is available to people who can show they suffered persecution or fear persecution because of race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or membership in a particular social group. Winning asylum allows a person to remain in the United States and eventually apply for permanent residence. Losing can lead to removal.
The backlog has become a central argument for both parties' immigration policy changes. USCIS had about 1.5 million pending asylum applications as of last fall, according to government figures cited by CBS. Immigration courts had 3.3 million pending cases as of March, including 2.3 million involving asylum claims, according to data CBS attributed to TRAC.
